


~ Dark Star ~  by Spiced Wine

by Spiced_Wine



Category: Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Drama, M/M, Slash, dubcon, noncon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-01-27
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2017-10-30 04:50:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 17
Words: 75,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/327926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spiced_Wine/pseuds/Spiced_Wine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~ An ancient sword reforged by Sauron, long thought lost, now wielded by one of the Sons of Thunder from who the orcs flee in terror.<br/>A Dark Lord who seeks to bind the Elves to him, mightier servants even than the Nazgûl.</p>
  <p>“Do not be jealous, my beautiful darkness. Thou must admit that to have one or both of Elrond's sons serving me would be truly poetic.”</p>
  <p>The Shadow of Dol Guldur is calling.</p>
  <p>A crossover of characters and histories between my Dark Prince 'verse and Ziggy's incredible <a href="http://www.lotrfanfiction.com/viewstory.php?sid=13244">The Sons of Thunder.</a><br/></p>
</div>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All my stories contain incest, and there is Sauron/Vanimórë in this first chapter, so don't read if such subject matter disturbs you.

**Relevant Dates.**  
Third Age: 2509 Celebrían is captured by Orcs, and receives a poisoned wound. Departs to the West 2510.

2850 Gandalf enters Dol Guldur once again and discovers Thráin II imprisoned there. Thráin dies soon afterwards, but not before giving Gandalf a map and key.

2851 The White Council discover proof that the Necromancer of Dol Guldur is Sauron returned. Gandalf urges an immediate attack, but Saruman rejects this.

(From the Encyclopedia of Arda.)

**Please note:** All my stories contain incest, and there is Sauron/Vanimórë in this first chapter, so don't read if such subject matter disturbs you.  


**Chapter 1 ~ What Knowest Thou of Anguirel?**

  
  
* The world fragmented. Green and gold dimmed, grew shadow like mould furring old bread. A fading autumn sun shone on Lothlórien and southern Mirkwood alike, but Mirkwood's trees gorged on light, soaked it in dimness, mocked its attempts to illuminate Night.   
Once those distant woods had showed green, deep and mysterious. Before the shadow came.   
One of the Úlairi, some guessed in the early years. Galadriel, whose eyes had stared into glory and blood and ruin would gaze eastward across Anduin, face moulded into ageless gravity, thoughts hidden. At times, if one looked close, red fire danced in the clear grey.   
  
_Stronger,_ she said. _Older._   
  
The Silvan Elves had withdrawn northward, yet the shadow stretched its fingers forth, and followed them.   
  


~~~

There were two of them in the chamber. Lamplight plucked gold threads from the arras, blinked yellow eyes over silver cups, the wine-jug that breathed spice. A fire whispered, hugging charred wood to its breast.

“They will not come. Not any more.”

“Some will.”

“Thou hast made its reputation too dark, _my Lord._ ” The emphasis on the last words was honed by anger Ages old, still bitterly sharp.

“Thou knowest better.” One of the men turned from the window. He was smiling urbanely. Against the night that hunched outside, his hair was pale as flax, falling like bolts of water over a furred robe. There was youth in his face, but none in the lilac-coloured eyes that captured and held the firelight. He looked like a king, but no king of Middle-earth had possessed such power save one, long gone (and unlamented). Sitting back in deep cushions, he reached for wine. The warrior who leaned negligently against the wall, arms folded, looked back at him, face hard and closed as a beautiful marble tomb.

A stranger would have said these two could not be more unlike, but greater familiarity would reveal similarities in the expressions, the lift of a brow, the cynical curl of the mouth, an absolute self-possession in this place of shadows that dared not encroach on them. They had looked into the eyes of the darkest god.

A scream flayed the night, rapacious, starving. Only the damned could scream thus, and the Nazgûl were utterly damned. It was they who brought the shadows to Amon Lanc, where once an Elvenking had ruled. Held between death and life their presence ripped the world, and the Void seeped through the conduit of their enspelled souls. Thus the fortress on the stony hill became Dol Guldur, a name of dread where the unliving prowled. And the man who sat, fair and smiling, was Power. He could not dwell upon the Earth without marking it, bending it toward his presence.

“That is why thou art here,” the warrior said. “Well, thou art an optimist, I will give thee that.”

“Of course.” Barad-dûr was long arisen, Mordor thrived behind the natural armor of its mountains and the gate that walled it against the West. “And thou art here because I command it, and because of that silver haired beauty in the north. Dost thou fear to find him here one day, or hope for it?”

The warrior's eyes _burned._

_If I were not whom I am,_ Sauron thought, _I would be dead now._  
“I will deal with the wood-Elves in mine own time, and that is not yet.” He waved a hand, pushing the matter away. “Others concern me more immediately. They will move against me when they are sure who I am. And I need to know them. Come here.” he beckoned and the warrior, resisting the order just long enough to declare his independence, moved across the room, went down gracefully on one knee.

“Thou knowest them.” His voice was taut with the effort of control. “Or may make an accurate guess.”

“Yes, I can guess.” He tilted up the firm chin. “But I prefer not to make my plans based on guesswork, Vanimórë. And neither,” smiling, “dost thou.”

“Whom dost thou want?” his son asked. “And why?”

Sauron looked into his eyes.  
“If only there were more than one of thee,” he said, mock-mournfully. “Imagine Glorfindel bound as thou art, Tindómion Maglorion. The Sons of Thunder.”

Vanimórë pulled his head away. “And I think I would almost like to see thee try, father.” He did not attempt to disguise the acid in his tone. “So that is it: Elven warriors serving thee? Impossible.”

“Why thinks't thou I wanted Maglor? Didst thou truly believe I meant to break him?” Sauron wondered. “My clever, foolish son. Do not confuse me with Melkor.”

That brought Vanimórë's eyes back to his.

“I do not waste such gifts.”

“He was _dying._ ”

“He would not have died, any more than thou wilt die. That bloodline is not so easily broken.” He caught the great rope of Vanimórë's plaited hair wound it about his hand, and tugged. “ _Tamed_ perhaps...” he mused and seeing the fury rise again, laughed gently. “I knew thou wouldst release him.”

“Thou might well.”

“And yet he hated thee.” Sauron whispered against the lush, unwilling mouth. “Whom do I want? Tell me: What knowest thou of Anguirel?” Slowly unlacing Vanimórë's tunic, uncovering what was always a feast to the eye, he felt his son's acute brain retrieve the knowledge from a dark past: Húrin chained on Thangorodrim, Melkor's curse upon his kin, upon Túrin, Beleg Cúthalion, Gondolin, Maeglin the traitor...Vanimórë had seen only Húrin and Maeglin, but Sauron, close to Melkor, knew all that had passed, and through him, so did his son.  
Loosing the black braid, letting the mass of hair flood through his hands to the rugs, Sauron said almost idly: “Melkor took it from Maeglin in Angband, gave it to me to replicate. It was a remarkable piece of craftsmanship, almost sentient.” He rose, drawing Vanimórë with him, and his son forestalled him then, offed boots and breeches himself, an act of defiance, an attempt to retain his dignity.

“I experimented with, and reforged Anguirel.” Sauron shrugged off his robe, went to stand behind his son, who lowered himself to his knees. “There was a somberness in it, a darkness, even then. Mûrazôr* had the temerity to ask it of me, when he was still a Man. A fitting blade, he said, for my greatest servant.” He smiled, and Vanimórë braced, hissing as Sauron penetrated him. He had prepared himself, knowing what this summons would entail, and hatred smoked from him, the tattoos coiling like serpents as he arched that long, supple back.

“I am being gentle,” Sauron chided, holding back the burgeoning pleasure, the fire in his loins as the ferocious grip that enclosed him. Kindness tested his son in ways more subtle than cruelty ever could. “Dost thou not want to know what became of it, why I speak of it now?”

“Tell me!” The words came as a snarl.

“I gave it to the fool. To my _greatest servant._ ” His breath caught as he plunged harder into dark red heat. Ambitious and proud, Mûrazôr unerringly recognized Vanimórë as his greatest rival, but refused to see himself as less than an equal.

“My Lord, I am the son of a king,” he had said, and Sauron admired his daring, if not his intelligence.

“And he is _my_ son,” Sauron crushed his pretensions with a snap of fire across the Man's mind. “Be content with what I give thee.”

Mûrazôr had been made to know, as the Ring he had so eagerly accepted devoured him, that Vanimórë occupied a place in Sauron's agelong plans no other could fill. As for his son, he regarded Mûrazôr with unveiled disdain, rebuffing his overtures, and thus earning his hatred.

“He took it to Angmar, and lost it when he fled from Glorfindel. But I know who found it, and who holds it now.”  
He said no more for a long time, abdicating his control to delight in this interlude and, this time, to give pleasure. Battle though he would and did, beneath Vanimórë's power and brilliance, that immense and cultivated self-possession, lay a deeply sensual creature. In the end, his cry of release was harsh with self-loathing. (And, buried so far down in his soul that he did not hear it, but Sauron did, Vanimórë wept the scalding, frightened tears of a betrayed child.)

_One day,_ Sauron thought, _thou wilt know everything, and see through this cloud of hatred which suits me so very well. But not yet._

After, bathed and drinking wine with Vanimórë, splendidly contemptuous of his response and nakedness alike, kneeling at his feet, Sauron elaborated.  
“He has the blood of the Ainur, of the Finwii. I can feel him when he wields Anguirel.” He closed his hand as about the hilt of a sword, opened his mind to the visions, gave them to Vanimórë.

The warrior's face was a jewel framed by a cloud of nightblack hair. His eyes were moonstone-grey and the fire behind them imperishable, tortured, drew its intensity from one long gone into the Dark. Sauron felt his son's startled recognition; the Fëanorean beauty was unmistakable, as it had been in Celebrimbor, in Maglor, but in this man was as dangerous and dark as the black fell-fires of Barad-dûr. Anguirel glowered balefully, the ancient Elven runes sang a warning filled with the red run of blood and reflected flame.

“Who is he?” Vanimórë asked unwillingly into the silence.

“One of Elrond's twin sons.” Sauron smiled a little over the rim of his cup. “They fought in the Angmar wars. He looks more like unto his Finwion predecessors than his father.”

“What didst thou to the blade?”

Sauron raised his brows. “Very little. I was more interested in its forging. But every maker adds something.” He picked up a fruit knife from the table, ran it across one finger. Scarlet bloomed along the cut. He ran it across his son's lips.

“Thy blood.” That was not so small a thing.

“His is a fierce and wounded soul. He slakes shame in slaughter since his mother's rape.” He pushed his finger deeper into Vanimórë's mouth, saw the question in his eyes. “Beyond Imladris I can see him. Mountain orcs captured his mother, used her until he found her. He did not know her, and watched as she was raped, and he lusted, as warriors do in battle. Now his guilt rides him nigh to madness, and he seeks to assuage it in killing. And the sword, ah, Anguirel delights in it.”

Vanimórë sucked the blood, drew his head back.

“Thou seekest to lure him here.”

“And he will come.” Sauron slid his hand about his son's throat. “He visits Lothlórien at whiles, has done for many years. I shall ensure that when he comes again, his own burning soul and Anguirel draw him to Dol Guldur, demanding vengeance.” He smiled. “Do not be jealous, my beautiful darkness. Thou must admit that to have one or both of Elrond's sons serving me would be truly poetic.”

Vanimórë's mouth curled in scorn. “For a brilliant man, thou canst be surprisingly delusional, _father._ ”

Sauron laughed. “What wilt thou wager?”

“I never wager on certainties.”

“Neither do I. He will come when I call his name.”  
He rose, walked to the great bed, deep in silvery furs and fine wool, and lifted something from a hook on the wall; a bridle not fashioned for any horse. The headstall was flecked with gems, the bit silver, set with little, blunt spikes. He worked at the buckles, watching his son's reaction with amusement.

“Come here,” he said.

~~~

The last winters had been vicious. Fell-wolves howled at the borders of the Golden Wood, and there were orc-bands with them, mad with hunger. Galadhrim patrols crossed the river, from Lothlórien's fresh-cool glades to a wasteland where the wind scoured fallen snow, scurried among the dead grasses. Once they found the remains of Men, perhaps driven from their holding upriver, and caught under the merciless blaze of the winter stars. Little remained but stains on the snow, scraps of furred cloaks that had not withstood the cold.

Spring came in power that year, her green skirts sweeping the snow north to the borders of the world. But still the orcs hunted, and the patrols pursued them, waiting on the grasslands until night fell, their cloaks melting into the land. It was on one such night under an muscling storm that hurled rain down like retribution, that two of the patrol were taken.  
The skirmish was brief and savage, the rain another enemy. Only when the orcs broke and ran, did Haldir, checking his warriors for poisoned wounds, realize that he lacked two men. The Galadhrim pursued, but the greater part of the orcs turned, gave battle, and died. It seemed the captured Elves were a prize they were willing to give their lives for.

Or had been ordered to.

The patrol reached the edge of Mirkwood and entered, but skilled and forest-born though they were, their skill recked nothing against the Shadow. The storm had spent itself, but the darkness under the pines was thick, clogging. An unwholesome mist bloomed, and the path they followed faded into nothing. Black vines whispered sick-sweet dreams against their flesh. And there were screams; foxes, Haldir told himself, but with a peculiar intelligent malice to them. They came to the edge of a sucking bog that reeked of carrion, marsh gas wavering above it. When they skirted it, they found another path, which lead them, mocked by screams, back to the edge of the forest.

Eight returned to Lothlórien from that patrol, harrowed by shame. Mirkwood had taken them one by one silently, and Haldir cursing his pain and frustration, lead the survivors home. The dank fog seemed to cling to their spirits like unhomed _fae_.

“It would seem the Shadow of Dol Guldur wanted thee,” Galadriel said, steel surfacing in her voice. Her long hands folded tightly.

“Lady,” Haldir said, “We need more...”

“No,” Celeborn quashed him, and the Lady stared unblinking eastward as if she had not heard. “None of thee would return.”

But after that time the orcs grew bolder. One could hear them at night from the eves of the Golden Wood, hunting, camping, drinking. One night fires were lit, and the Elves saw the distant shapes capering and rutting.

By dawn they were gone, and Haldir took his men to investigate. They ran through beauty, the late spring morning ripe as a woman heavy with her summer child – and found what remained of two of their lost patrol.  
The eyeless heads were mounted on spears, they had been scalped, ears sliced off, lips sewn shut over mouths filled with excrement. Haldir lifted his head, stared white rage toward Mirkwood, then spun at the drum of the ground under galloping hooves. The riders with mirrored, beautiful control, wheeled closer to take their measure of what had passed. Haldir knew them; it was said that the orcs of the Misty Mountains fled in terror from these twins with their eyes of ice and frozen fire, the Sons of Thunder.

~~~

The stench of orcs, of orc-seed, heavy in the lovely morning, leered at Elrohir from a dark cave, and he said, “No.”

Only his brother understood, but as he turned his mount, Haldir, as if realizing his intent, reached for the reins.  
“You _cannot!_ ” he protested. “Sons of Elrond or no, the darkness of Dol Guldur will swallow you.”

“We warred against Angmar,” Elladan said, serene as the sky, and as impervious to Haldir's pleading. “We have gone into darkness before.”

Elrohir looked away, felt the bones in his hand stretch taut about Aícanaro's hilt.

“Do you, Haldir, return to Caras Galadhon. And take these,” Elladan gestured to the mutilated heads.

The Galadhel looked appalled.  
“I will send my men back. You will not go alone.”

“No,” Elrohir said harshly. “You have already essayed it. This is for us.”

Haldir began to protest, and Elrohir simply looked full into his eyes. Whatever the warrior had been about to say crumbled on his tongue, and he inclined his head as to an inevitability. But he would not leave, he said. He would send some of his company back, and wait until the brothers returned.  
Or did not.

~~~

Elrohir stared at the crouching gloom of Mirkwood. His blood hissed in his ears hot, swift, and Aícanaro hummed eager violence against his flesh. The touch of a hand, that calming moon-blue breath across the pulse of his rage, a rage that quenched itself only and briefly in blood, brought his head around to meet his brother's eyes.

“We are here,” he said, as if that explained everything. This was not their land, nor did they have a duty, but neither of them considered this a duty. Their self-appointed task of escorting Arwen to Lothlórien had been accomplished, and she was now ensconced in Caras Galadhon. Who was there to command them?

The sun, slowly sinking, struck at the wall of trees. A low mist exhaled from deep within. It smelled of rot, stagnant water. Every nerve in Elrohir's body screamed anticipation.

“You knew,” Elladan said. “You knew since we crossed the river.” There was no censure, no accusation, only acceptance that he understood. Blood called for blood in both of them, but for Elrohir vengeance was darker, more violent, terrible.

“Yes.” He had sensed death, seen it like a crimson corona about the sun.

“It is foolhardy.”

“Yes.”

Both of them knew what, or rather whom, dominated their grandam's mind when it dwelled on Dol Guldur. The name evoked no fear in Elrohir. He quivered like a hound that scents its prey, waits for its master to slip the leash. But how could he explain to Elladan that the darkness of the forest beckoned him, sultry and seductive as a lover in the night, that his fuming rage demanded slaughter. That last at least, his brother understood, if not why.

“They will all be long dead.” But Elladan was not trying to dissuade him.

“We cannot know that,” Elrohir said. “The orcs are not so far ahead of us. And there is always vengeance.”

They stepped into the trees.  
And Mirkwood drank them.

~~~ 

The woods about Imladris would be alive on such an evening, Lothlórien's glades starred with _elanor_ and _niphredil._ This was another world, a silent one. Moisture clung from the pine needles, the cobwebs that swagged from tree to tree. Fungi, sweating unhealthy pallor, erupted from the forest floor, from wet bark. One cluster, over-ripe, pustulent, burst, scattering a dust of spores. Elrohir waved the tiny clouds away, saw movement, and span toward it. Only the mist. It moved among the pines in unnatural patterns as if disturbed by fitful winds in this place where no breeze penetrated. He looked back, and could not see where they had entered the forest, yet only moments had passed. A spike of panic stabbed at his guts and as ever, when fear rose, he lifted his head, challenging it until it curled sullenly upon itself.

_If a warrior allows fear to unman him he has lost the battle,_ Glorfindel had told the twins long ago. _Lost it for himself and all those who fight with him. Fear is as much your enemy as those you fight._

He had looked at them, the reborn Elf-lord, with those jewel-blue eyes that had been burned away when he fell with the Balrog, his hands on their shoulders, and the sun running molten through his hair.

_Yes, I have feared,_ he had said, his smile radiant, confiding. _And so will you. And you will learn how to conquer it._

Elrohir took a long, steadying breath. His brother touched his arm, pointed. There was a path through the pines, overhung with webs and narrow, but straight, trampled by the passing of heavy feet. Elladan crouched, frowning, then rose again lithe, soundless.  
“Black uruks.” His voice was pitched very low, and the woods ate it.

Mountain orcs were a smaller breed. Black Uruks originated in Mordor, were larger, stronger, more cunning. They had formed the bulk or Sauron's army in the Last Alliance, and few were seen in the West.

The scream was a razor across their nerves. It skirled up in agony, choked to silence, then “No, No, _No!_ ”

And then they were running, intent, furious. The voice was a woman's. The voice was their mother's. And though Elrohir knew the tortured Elf could not be Celebrian, that she had long departed Middle-earth, logic found no handhold in his blind, intent mind. The trees, black, hunched close, resembled rock, the carrion-smell of fungi and rot was from another place, another time.

The shadows deepened as the sun set beyond the Hithaeglir, and the shrieks rose again, more distant, ended in despairing moans. The pines flickered by in their cloaks of mist, and the path they followed lead into a tangle of rotting wood.

Chill sweat idled down Elrohir's temple. He turned to his brother, chest tight with the effort not to scream, to loose the horror. And Elladan was not there.

The shock, the impossibility of Elladan's absence should not have steadied him, and yet it did. He slammed his eyes closed for a moment, teeth set, recalling Celeborn's words of the fated Galadhrim excursion, how paths changed, turned the warriors, accustomed to forest, back on themselves, chased them to the edge of bogs, hounded them with cries.

_It is not my mother._

And still, and still...

“ _Please!_ ” Celebrian's voice cried.

He spun and, faintly luminous in the gloom, another track yawned before him, a tunnel under the close-growing trees.

_Into the dark._

As he ran, he reached down into the soul-bond, and touching his brother's spirit. Elladan was alive, but lost.

_Just as I am lost._

Paths opened easily, then vanished to reappear again. The woman's cries sounded from different directions, so near at hand he would stop, call out to her, voice falling muffled. _Fool,_ he berated himself, and as he cursed, her voice begged and cajoled and accused him. He struck himself across the face, gagging on shame, needing the pain, wanting to kill and kill until the unwholesome ground was soaked with black blood.

_Elrohir!_ her voice called, sobbing, then, came the rhythmic moans of a woman in the throes of sex. _You wanted this, I saw you, you wanted me..._

He bent over and vomited abruptly. _No!_ His skin shivered, cold, clammy against his tunic.

_Help me!_

Hurdling a viscous pool, he plunging through a wall of fog and shockingly, out of the pines. He came to a halt, blinking at the change. Wind stirred his hair with a scent of iron and oddly, fire, pushing the mist and lingering night down into the trees. Before him the ground rose, mossy boulders and outcroppings of rock shaking themselves free of the forest. Above him the natural bedrock rose into the hard lines and angles of masonry. Against a clear dawn sky, walls and towers showed black, sharp. Angry elegance brooded deep in the sculpted stone. He breathed control into his lungs, and his mind cleared, as if he had walked out of smoke. Tears burned cold on his cheeks, and he swallowed through a throat gone ashy. His mother was not here. He had been led, lured to this place.

_Dol Guldur._

_Necromancer._

~~~

~~~

End Notes:

* Mûrazôr, second son of Tar-Ciryatan, twelfth king of of Númenor. This is MERP fanon, not canon. The Witch-king is not named as far as I am aware.

**Anguirel** was one of a pair of iron-cutting swords forged by Eöl, the Dark Elf, from an iron meteorite. Anguirel's mate was Anglachel, which Eöl gave to Thingol in payment for leave to dwell in Nan Elmoth.

Anguirel's history is far more mysterious. The only specific detail we have is that Eöl kept it for himself, but it was stolen by his son Maeglin. This must have happened when Maeglin and his mother Aredhel fled Nan Elmoth for Gondolin, so presumably the sword was taken to Turgon's hidden city. What became of it after that is unknown.  
(From Tolkien Gateway.)

Elladan and Elrohir were born early in the Third Age. The wars against Angmar and the Witchking's deafeat, when he fled from Glorfindel's unshielded power, took place in 1975 Third Age. Imladris was besieged during those wars, and I would consider it very likely that Elladan and Elrohir fought under Glorfindel, thus the Witchking would have known of them, and what he knew, Sauron would know.  


  
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters and settings are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.

This story archived at <http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=618>  



	2. ~ Fragmented ~

He dreamed.  
  
 _“Do not take this blade, Elrohir.”_  
  
The sky was a wound, bleeding the weary years of war across a shattered realm. It spilled scarlet over Glorfindel's armour, set copper inlay in his braided hair. The light that had sent the Witchking fleeing into the shadows still blazed in his gem-blue eyes.  
  
“Because _he_ carried it?” Elrohir asked. The hilt fitted his hand as if fashioned for him. “But he did not make it. This is an Elf-forged blade.”  
  
“Yes, it is.” Glorfindel's gauntleted fingers traced the runes that ran molten in the sunset. “Its name was Anguirel. Maeglin brought it to Gondolin.”  
  
Anguirel, twin of Anglachel, Gurthang that was; the blade that killed Beleg Cúthalion, and later took the life of Túrin Turambar. Elrohir made a sound of astonishment. He should have guessed; he had never seen a sword of this colour before, and knew the tales, but Anguirel's making was so long ago, in a world drunk by the Western Sea.  
  
“It has been in a dark place, touched by great power. And it will take thee into the darkness.”  
  
A wolfs-paw stroked up Elrohir's spine.  
“Is it cursed? Yet the Witchking threw it away.”  
  
Glorfindel frowned, tilted his head. “It has been _changed._ It _feels._ ”  
  
“What do _you_ feel?”  
  
“There is blood in it.”  
  
A long silence unfurled under the sky.  
  
“The Witchking used it for evil.” Elrohir broke it at last. “I will raise it for Elves and Men. Do you not think I am strong enough?”  
  
Almost, Glorfindel smiled. “I know thy strength of body and mind, but blood desires blood.” The dying sun sent a last red ray down the blade. “It is a thing of power, and power, like this blade, is always double-edged. Consider also, _why_ would the wraith-lord cast it away? It has served him well enough.”  
  
None of them wanted him to keep Anguirel; not Glorfindel, Elrond, Gildor, or Galadriel, when first he bore it to Lothlórien. The blade stitched a crimson thread across the flesh of her palm when she touched it.  
“Keep it sheathed within this land,” she commanded him, and so he did, for one did not need a weapon in Lothlórien or Imladris, but beyond their borders the blade sang crimson. And its song deepened after his mother's torment, melding with his own threnody of guilt-grief. Even when he set it aside, it was an unquiet presence, pulsing like a heart. Elrohir was no fool; there _was_ a darkness to the blade he named Aicanáro*, an awareness, but even Glorfindel had said that it was not, in any real sense, alive.  
  
And then had come the Black Winter, bitter and unrelenting. Snow fell, froze, fell again. The east wind scoured the lands raw, and low skies darkened soon after noon to nights of killing cold. Imladris did not suffer greatly, for Vilya protected it from the worse weathers, and its storehouses were full after a rich autumn, but the Dúnedain settlements had not been so fortunate. Orcs and hill trolls came from their dens, driven by hunger, Fell-wolves were abroad in packs, and Glorfindel lead out warriors.  
  
The dreams began after one particularly vicious engagement south of the Ettenmoors, when Aicanáro rested from death like a man drowsing after a sumptuous meal. Elrohir dreamed of his mother running through misty grey woods, into a danger he could sense but not see. No matter how swift his pursuit he could never catch her, and woke to despairing rage. He was accustomed to such dreams, his own impotence in them, but these were of no place he had ever set foot, and he did not know what they might mean. They drove him to greater violence, spilling blood onto the snow, scattering it into the pitiless wind. Elladan watched him, concern in his eyes, and Glorfindel with something more.  
  
When the winter ended, soft south winds filling the waterfalls of Imladris with snowmelt, Arwen had declared her intention to visit Lothlórien, and Elrohir lifted his head as if at a distant call.  
 _Yes,_ he thought, and the closer they drew to the Golden Wood, the more seductive the call became. He knew why when Celeborn revealed the orcs viciousness, Haldir's patrol that entered Mirkwood and lost over half its number.  
  
“That is uncharacteristic of the orcs.” Elladan's eyes were steel-bright, steel-hard.  
  
“Unless they are under orders,” his grandsire agreed.  
  
Elrohir said nothing but later, Galadriel sought him out. He did not deliberately avoid her, but it had become obvious to him that she knew his guilt, saw the shame he clasped to his heart. She did not directly speak of it, which came to incense him, for how could she forebear?  
  
“It would be better if thou wert to return to Imladris,” she told him with what, for her, was unusual bluntness.  
  
“Why?” he asked, equally curt.  
  
“Thou canst feel the call.” She leaned closer, and her eyes seemed to enlarge like a cats', the pupil swallowing the grey. “Thou knowest the Shadow, Elrohir. And through the sword, it knows thee.”  
  
Suddenly and intensely resentful of her allusions, he snapped through his teeth, “And do you know _why_ it – _He_ – calls me, Lady?”  
  
She blinked slowly.  
“Thou art like _him._ ” She did not refer to Sauron, Elrohir knew. “Like _them_ , even unto thy face. There was nothing they dared not look upon, nothing they would not challenge. And where are they now? But thou, grandson, wear _his_ face. His spirit burns in thine eyes. Thou art _too_ like him.” An old ire stripped her voice of serenity. “Be careful.”  
  
“It is too late, Lady, to be careful.”  
He turned his back and walked away. She was maddeningly elusive as ever, yet this time there could be little doubt of her meaning. It was a warning, and one he had not heeded.  
  
~~~  
  
The trees clustered at the foot of Dol Guldur like beggars outside the court of a great king. Elrohir had not expected such a fortress, this black spike hammered into the forest, and recalled his father's descriptions of Barad-dûr. A sense of power radiated from the walls, as stones throw off the heat of a summer day. Dol Guldur felt alive, and Elrohir's skin tightened at the sensation of being regarded by a pitiless intelligence. With an effort, he dragged his eyes down. Close to the base, at regular intervals, huge iron wolfs' heads jutted from the stone, their open, snarling maws disgorging a heavy smoke that coiled down the rocks and seeped into the forest. A river poured from under the hill, and the outflow steamed. The air was filled with an acrid-sweet taint.  
  
 _The mists are not natural. Elladan?_  
  
 _Yes. I see it._  
  
 _Where are you?_  
  
 _Looking north. The sun is rising on my left hand. There is running water on my right._  
  
 _The river is on my left. Wait for me._  
  
The water was neither deep nor wide but Elrohir grimaced as he leaped across it. Tastes he recognized and some he did not settled on his tongue. The earth shrugged itself as he landed, and he went down hard, unexpectedly, on one knee.  
  
 _The air. There is something in the air._ He spat out a bitter taste.  
  
 _Elrohir!_ There was sharp concern in his brother's tone.  
  
 _We have been breathing it since we entered the woods. We can trust nothing we see or hear._  
It explained the hallucinations, the shapes seen in the forest, the fact that even the wood-born Galadhrim had gone astray. But there was no help for it. He might have mistrusted Elladan's mind-voice, save that his twin's soul was so deeply intertwined with his own that there could be no deception, no doubt.  
He went on, hampered by the trees, by eddying dizziness, until he came to a stony track that cleaved the forest, climbing the hill to tall black gates. Kneeling in the shadow of a pine, he gazed up at the parapets, the wink of light on metal helms. Orcs could endure daylight under cloud cover, but would be little use under the sun. The sentries must be Men. They would see him if he crossed the track unless he returned to the grim cover of the woods, which he was loath to do. _This_ was where he had to be.  
  
 _I have to find a way in. But first, Elladan._  
  
His mouth was dry, his head felt airy, detached from his body, as when he had drunk his first full glass of wine. He fancied that he could see through those frowning walls, to the pits and dungeons where prisoners screamed and died in unimaginable pain, where some of those missing Galadhrim might be even now, tormented. Icy perspiration pearled on his skin. Only a fool does not fear, but never had he experienced this unmanning. He took two deep breaths, looked at unsheathed Aícanaro to reassure himself that he was a warrior, that he had fought orcs, trolls and Fell-wolves, debased Men more wicked than any.  
  
 _I am of the blood of Lúthien, she who entered the Hells of Iron. I will not fear the Shadow of Morgoth's Shadow._  
  
 _“Thou knowest the Shadow, Elrohir. And it knows thee.”_  
  
The voice came from very far away. He could not remember whom had spoken the words, and the fact troubled him. His fingers flexed about Aícanaro's hilt as he raised it, and the runes seized the light. He stared at them.  
  
 _It will take thee into the darkness._ A different voice. A warning.  
  
The sword was a mirror of jet. He saw himself reflected, then smoke and fire ran through the metal, obliterating his image.  
  
 _Illusion. Trust nothing. The air is poison._  
  
He watched, like a man caught between sleeping and waking.  
  
Three star-bright gems hung in nothingness. A pair of eyes opened beneath them, and three jewels became five. The face was lost in shadow, but the eyes _flamed,_ violently, passionately alive.  
  
 _Illusion..._  
  
But so vivid.  
  
Seven white swans beat their way toward an empty city where the salt winds lamented a people long gone, and tossed a young Man's pale hair.  
  
A vast gate of polished steel opened to a hidden city, white-towered and proud above a green plain –  
– And now the city burned under a pall of smoke. Gilded armour scorched and blackened, a warrior fell dying, intertwined with some _thing_ that streamed ember flame. His face was burned away.**  
  
 _This_ he knew, the warrior, the death. It was legend, a memory carried in his blood.  
  
 _No!_ The shout was silent, his throat stopped with pain, but he did not look away, and some-one watched with him. There was an intent regard, so close it might have been at Elrohir's shoulder. Still he gazed, and Aícanaro opened, taking him _within._  
  
He was in another time and place. The land was cold, black rock, melted Ages past, huddled under rugs of frost. But there was fire here, great heat deep in the earth. One man stood alone, unafraid, waiting for death to come. His armour was a skin of silver, hair a cloud of night. He was more than beautiful, and Elrohir knew him, for his father had told this tale, given to him by two sons who had never ceased to grieve for theirs.  
  
It was quite impossible that the man should see him, but those gemfire eyes widened for a moment as if in recognition of something seen afar off. (And how many years had rolled, one after another, like surf, across Middle-earth, since this one's death?) Elrohir's heart slammed, heavy, swift. He reached out a hand – and flames screamed between them. There was a heartbeat of absolute darkness, then a wall of mountains pushed through it, as stones emerge from sinking flood-water. Here the world ended in iron and ice and unimaginable power. A King stood, sword raised in challenge. He could almost have been twin to the other warrior save for the eyes, star-blue, incandescent. And they too, seemed to touch Elrohir's, as startled as he, before a monumental, terrible presence slammed its shadow down and separated them.  
  
 _There was nothing they dared not look upon,_ said the voice he could not remember. _nothing they would not challenge. And where are they now?_  
  
He wanted to laugh, to weep. His breath came in pants. A distant warning chimed. _The air..._  
  
 _I do not fear the Shadow..._  
  
The languor released him. He _was_ of Lúthien's blood, but running beside it, almost counter to it, fumed the blood of the House of Finwë. A hard heritage, a doomed one, and glorious.  
  
He rose at the distant thud of horses hooves, swayed, and braced against a pine. It was so unexpected yet so ordinary a sound that he wondered if Dúhul and his brother's Galudhu, sent back toward the Galadhrim patrol, had followed them. Then, as he mentally numbered the horses, he discarded the notion.  
  
The troop flooded from the forest, shedding mist. They were led by a tall man astride a stallion any king would have envied. He wore black and the horse matched him, but he was not one of the Nazgûl. Elrohir had seen the Witchking in the wars against Angmar, and this rider's presence proclaimed vigorous life, not cold half-death. Smooth sinew slid in his arms as he wheeled the stallion, a thick rope of hair swinging to its belly. His face was helmed, invisible, but there was impatience in his movements as he turned again, leading the riders and carts up the path.  
A horn winded, its echoes falling mournfully into the trees, and the gates began to open. Elrohir sprinted behind the last of the wagons, throwing himself into cover beyond the track. All the riders were Men, he noted. Horses would not suffer orcs to ride them.  
  
His brother's cry brought him up from his crouch. Light-headed, he ran across cloying humus, kicked through bibulous fungi, Elladan's rising battle-wrath like a trumpet in his mind. The image of the warrior with the blue-silver eyes snapped across his mind like a war banner in a north wind, hard, sharp.  
  
He had looked like Elladan, and that thought _hurt._  
  
Elrohir sprang from the trees, Aícanaro catching fire from his mind. Great orcs, loping out of the gates in a verminous broil, barked as they saw him, hoisting their weapons. They were heavily armed in dull steel, faces muffled to the eyes. To his right came a swift flash of movement as Elladan sprinted from cover, his sword drawn and shining. And then, nonsensically, the orcs turned and began to run back to the gates. Far too slowly. Elladan was on them like a wolfhound.  
  
Aícanaro sang sweet murder. Pitch blood showered Elrohir as he cut his way toward his brother. He killed without thinking, without knowing that he killed. He spun on one foot, went down, stabbed up under a mail shirt, into the groin. The world reeled like a drunken dancer as he leaped, brought Aícanaro down between a neck and shoulder, saw the creature fall as he wrenched the blade free.  
  
 _They are not fighting. Why?_  
  
He could not see Elladan, and hit the creatures had come between them, the force of his loathing hammered into pure slaughter. As they fell before him, he found himself facing his twin. They held one another's eyes for a heartbeat, then wheeled toward the fortress as Dol Guldur uttered a deep groaning roar. Yellow-grey smoke flooded from the wolfs' heads. The vapour, heavier than air, spilled like wine.  
  
 _The orcs were masked..._  
  
It was his last coherent thought, before he found himself lying on his back, and the world closed its eyes.  
  
~~~  
  
Vanimórë raised a hand, and the troop came to a halt. At their backs Rhovannion rolled south, grass rippling like a pelt under the wind; ahead, the southern wall of Mirkwood inhaled the sunlight. The old track plunged into the forest, trees cleared each side to leave a waste of rotting stumps and strangling brambles. It was not an inviting prospect, but most of the men had traveled to Dol Guldur before, and would not show their fear. Vanimórë was untroubled. He felt the atmosphere, but it did not touch him. He knew its heart, which was greater than this gloomy spillage of power, and far more terrifying.  
At his word, the riders and wagoners drank a measure of emberwine before drawing veils over nose and mouth. The cloth was steeped in herbs that calmed the mind, countered the floating miasma in the air, but the veterans had been accustomed over the years, as one grows used to wine. Vanimórë looked them over, and said, as he always did, “Follow me. Heed no sound nor shadow, and do not leave the track.”  
  
He hand-picked the warriors for these journeys, and their safety and sanity touched his honour. It had become a source of pride to be chosen, which he had intended, for there must be some reward. This year, two of the troop were new, young men eager to prove themselves to their prince, but whose eyes, above their veils were now wide with trepidation. They would require watching and reassurance. He smiled approval at them, and flung his mind open like a bolt of cloth to settle upon the troop. It was all he could do. He could not match his father's power, but he could and would mitigate the insidious terror that would grow as they neared its source. At night they must needs camp, grouped close about the fires, burning herbs and purifying incense, so that they might loose their veils to eat. But some power kept the road clear, which was why it imperative no-one stray from it. Vanimórë had lost men before when the dark came down and the screams echoed, now near, now distant, the mist forming uncanny shapes.  
  
Vanimórë himself did not sleep on these journeys. He strolled the boundaries of the camp, so that the men might see him unperturbed. His deliberate perambulations brought him at length to Ryath and Kirin, who sat shoulder to shoulder, tossing knuckle-bones with would-be insouciance, emulating the older men. They were dicing for copper rings, though on their return to Rhun, they would be recompensed in gold. As they began to scramble to their feet, Vanimórë motioned them back, and threw down heavy silver of Mordor, the Eye and the Tower etched by firelight. The Eye appeared to wink at him, seeing, _knowing._. Through the bitterness that drew his mouth taut, he found a smile for the youths, and sat down cross-legged beside them. They had not been in his service long enough to lose their awe of him, and he attempted to put them at their ease by losing badly, wagering two throwing knives when his coin was gone. The tyros were from a poor tribe, and to own a weapon once carried by the Dark Prince would give them stature. Vanimórë accepted the fact of his influence and reputation even as he scorned his peculiar position. He neatly arranged the game so that each won a dagger, ending it when their piles of coins were equal.  
  
“My luck is quite out tonight.” He shared a cup of hot wine with them. The sleight-of-hand he had employed was so skilled that not even the canniest gambler would have noticed, though the veterans would know; they all possessed something of his.  
  
The relaxing wine-caul over the mens' minds was brutally shredded by a distant shriek. No mortal voice could shape that sound. Some-one cursed, and they ducked their heads as at a cold wind. Vanimórë rose, spoke words into the night that hissed like crimson fire, and the sound died away.  
On the third night, Mûrazôr was abroad again, and this time no command of his would silence the wraith-lord. Following the ice-clouds that trailed from the dead mind, Vanimórë felt Sauron's command impressed there. Images burned out of the mist: A sword sheered the night, sin-black, a lovely weapon of death, grey eyes reflected flame, and a woman screamed from a foetid cave.  
  
“We break camp now,” he said. No-one would sleep this night, and the men could rest in Dol Guldur. They were superstitious, and with good reason, but their quarters would be comfortable, the food and drink lavish. They could gamble, tell tales, play the tuneful pipes of their tribes, and boast, as men do, to keep the shadows at bay.  
The slowness of the wagons irked Vanimórë, but he dared not leave them. The lanterns that hung from them glowed dim as fireflies, and mist smothered the torches. He held his own high, a beacon for the men to follow as the images blinked into his mind.  
  
 _They are here._  
  
Dawn came reluctantly to the forest, but the sky opened clear over Dol Guldur, and the men murmured relief. The outer ward was full of great orcs, who drew aside as Vanimórë galloped through the gates. The men saw to their horses, then went gratefully to their quarters. Vanimórë took the steps to Sauron's chambers two at a time, already knowing his father was absent. Had he gone himself to lure in the _Peredhil_ twins? Did he truly believe that any-one with Elven blood would serve him?  
  
 _Excepting myself,_ he amended. He slammed a hand against the wall and cursed, spun round and ran.  
  
After his defeat in the Last Alliance, Sauron's presence in Vanimórë's soul had dwindled to a kernel that grew only slowly over a thousand years. A thousand years of freedom tucked away in his heart as a man might tuck away a memento from a lost lover. He had nursed a frail hope that Sauron's severance from the Ring would have greatly reduced him, so much of his essence had passed into it. It seemed that he was wrong. Perhaps Sauron could indeed entrap and bind the the _Peredhil,_ or deceive them, as he had in Ost-in-Edhil.  
  
Beyond the gates, Vanimórë heard the sudden clash of steel. He leapt up the walls of the gatehouse, balanced on the merlon, and stared down. Two black haired men were slaughtering the orcs with a panache and beauty that was a pleasure to witness. He could have exclaimed, Bravo! but it could not last. He knew how the spill of toxic power from Dol Guldur affected Elves and Men, and this was directed at the _Peredhil_. The tone of their minds held a deceptive glitter, like drunken men who vow they are sober but cannot walk a straight line. That they were on their feet at all was astonishing. And they were beautiful, for something deadly may yet be beautiful as love. One of them killed with a song like the kiss of blued steel, the other, the bearer of the black sword, was blood spilled on molten metal.  
  
 _Fire and lightning._  
  
As he watched, Anguirel's wielder cut his way through the orcs to stand beside his twin. Vanimórë had seen enough. Fury was rising in him, bright and dangerous.  
“The four of thee,” he gestured to the closest sentries. “With me.”  
  
Then came the brazen roar of Dol Guldur, as vast mechanism opened the internal sluices. The pipes within the wolfs- heads spewed vapour, and the _Peredhil_ vanished in sickly yellow mist. When it ran away to disperse into the forest, Vanimórë went down the wall like a cat, jumping the detritus of dead orcs to kneel beside them, feeling their pulses. He lifted his head as Mûrazôr stepped from the woods.  
“No.”  
  
 _They are no concern of thine, Slave._  
  
“Where is my father, _slave_?”  
  
 _And that is not, either, thy concern._  
  
Vanimórë stepped up to the wraith-lord, standing breast-to-breast.  
“I am making it so. But if he were here, he would not require thy presence, would he?” When no answer was forthcoming, he said, “He will know what I do. He always knows.” Turning to the sentries who had followed, he said, “Bring them in.”  
He had a little time, but why was Sauron not here to see his plan bear fruit, and where were the other Nazgûl?  
  
~~~  
  
Elrohir woke, and dreamed again.  
  
A block of sunlight lay across the bed, warm on his bare arms. His hair was loose on the covers, a little damp. He wondered hazily why he was here, not in his own chambers in Imladris, and then, breath going hard into his lungs, he sat up.  
  
 _Elladan!_  
  
 _I am here._  
  
Relief fetched a long sigh from his very soul. He looked about him, curious, and did not see what he expected. Opposite him a lively little summer fire danced, sweet with the scent of herbs. The room was small, neat, an officer's room perhaps, plain, but not devoid of comfort. The narrow windows were glazed, there was a pitcher of wine on a table, a cup of heavy silver. He reached for it, pushing the blankets aside, then drew his hand back.  
  
Where _are you, Elladan?_  
  
At his question, the door opened. He came to his feet.  
  
The one who entered was Noldo. Elrohir's world tilted again, and he staggered. A strong arm caught him. He smelled leather, spices, and wrenched back.  
“Thy brother is safe.” The man's accent was exotic. “He is in the next room. Drink.”  
  
Elrohir glared mistrust as the other poured wine, sipped, and offered the cup.  
“Who are you?”  
But he knew. This man too was a legend, but no lay had been made for him, if he was whom Elrohir thought he was.  
His beauty was shocking, a gem of price found unexpectedly. The eyes were purple, dense and brilliant. White flesh lay suave as cream over a high-boned, arrogant face softened only by a mouth made for pleasure, and black hair swung in a heavy braid to his knees. If those unearthly eyes were not Elvish, that tamed wealth of hair certainly was. Supple black leather hugged long thighs and wide shoulders, and the sombre colour only served to enhance him.  
  
“No-one,” he said, with the hint of a wry smile. “Drink. It is important for thee to recover, and swiftly.”  
  
 _I know you._  
  
“I met Elrond, long ago.”  
  
Elrohir grappled with the fleece that muffled his thoughts, his strength. At once, the man was beside him again.  
  
“There is poison in the air around Dol Guldur,” he said. “It is like a narcotic to those who breathe it. It saps the strength and breeds visions. And there are other things of course; power leaches outward from the center.”  
  
Elrohir remembered the mist, the metallic tang in his mouth, the vapour. He could still taste it. There had been orcs. A dream, or a nightmare? He had been afraid, but he felt no fear now. The man proferred the cup again, and this time he took it. The wine was rich as broth, steeped with herbs. It lay calm in his stomach, melted warm through his veins. With a brief nod of approval, the other pulled back a hanging skin to reveal another door. It opened into a similar chamber, but Elrohir spared it less than a glance. Elladan, sitting up, shook off the coverlets, and came into his arms. Wordlessly they embraced until both hearts beat to the same rhythm. His brother was legitimate, real in a world where nothing else felt real. Elladan's face was grave, resolute.  
  
“How do you feel?” Elrohir asked.  
  
The response was an infinitesimal shake of the head.  
  
“The effects of the smoke linger,” the man said behind them. “But thou wert incredibly resilient to come so far.”  
  
Elrohir drew his fingers through his brother's glassy black hair, reassuring himself of Elladan's reality, and his brother's eyes smiled then moved past him. They burned in this place like uncovered lamps of crystal, brighter than Elrohir had ever seen them. Light against the darkness?  
He said curiously, “Glorfindel called you Vanimórë.”  
  
 _Vanimórë._ The enigmatic prisoner of the Last Alliance whom, Glorfindel had said once, was Noldoran, but bound to Sauron. It was a thing little spoken of, for the undeniable and ominous fact that an Elf could be so enslaved and yet live.  
  
“Yes.” The man's face was expressionless. He crossed to the window, looked out, then turned back. “I hoped thou wouldst not heed his call.”  
  
“We came to avenge the Galadhrim.” Elladan's voice was undimmed by fear, and Elrohir loved him for that. “There was no call.”  
  
“Thou didst what he purposed and hoped.” Vanimórë moved out of the shadow. “He knows of thee from Angmar. There are still those who defy him, names of power in Lothlórien, Imladris, in Mirkwood itself. He does not forgive nor forget. It will please him greatly to know the hawks came to the lure.”  
  
“Where is he?” Elrohir asked, and wondered if this were part of the hallucination, if he still slept, somewhere in the forest. Should he not fear in the very heart of Dol Guldur? Then he remembered the visions he had seen in Aícanaro, and felt a thrill of burning ice.  
“My sword,” he said.  
  
Vanimórë nodded toward a neat pile of clothes on a chest. Both swords lay there, clean of blood. Elrohir crossed to the chest, curled his fingers about Aícanaro's hilt, felt its welcome.  
  
“I do not know where he is. We have to use this time well. Come. I know a different way out.”  
  
The clothes were not theirs. They were too befouled with blood, Vanimórë said, and had replaced them with tunics and breeches in his own serviceable black leather. As he tightened laces, Elrohir glanced up.  
“Glorfindel said you were his slave.”  
  
“Even so.” Vanimórë's eyes narrowed on dark Aícanaro. “And if he told thee that, perhaps he told thee other things about me, enough to trust me perhaps? Thou must do so, to even hope to leave here.”  
  
Elrohir did not reply, intent on trying to read the vivid, fascinating face, and recalling, still with some difficulty, Glorfindel's words about this man: An unwilling slave, one who defied his master in all ways he could.  
  
“This – ” Vanimórë lightly touched the black sword. “It sings a dark song, does it not?”  
  
Elrohir flicked the blade up. Its point came to rest on the man's breast.  
“It sings _my_ song,” he said.  
  
With a grim little smile at the corners of his mouth, Vanimórë's said, “Sauron reforged it long ago, in Angband. Thou didst know. Not that, perhaps, but somewhat. Glorfindel certainly should have. It called thee here.”  
  
“I chose to come!” Elrohir spat the words through his teeth, and Aícanaro pressed deeper. He could not see the blood against the black of the man's tunic, but the sword felt its warm tear, and so did Elrohir, as a spark of fire in his veins.  
  
“No.” Elladan's hand closed on his arm.  
  
“Wildfire in thine eyes,” Vanimórë said, like black velvet, apparently unconcerned. “And starfire in his. No wonder he wants thee. I know thy heritage. Thou art everything that he desires to conquer, to _own_.”  
  
“Does he think,” Elladan said, disbelief in his voice. “that if he killed us, my father, my grandmother, would cease to oppose him, would leave Middle-earth?”  
  
A strange expression flickered in the purple eyes.  
“He does not want to kill thee.”  
  
“We are hostages, then?”  
  
“Not that either. He wants,” Vanimórë said, quite gently, “to bind thee to his service, as I am bound.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Sharp Flame, Fell Fire. (This is Ziggy's name for Elrohir's sword, of course.)
> 
> ** I know most people know this, but just in case:  
> These visions are of Tuor who was guided to Nevrast, where Turgon lived before removing to Gondolin. Ulmo told Turgon to leave arms in Nevrast for one who would come in the future and aid him.  
> Tuor was guided to Gondolin by Voronwë, one of those Turgon sent to try and find Valinor, but who was cast back onto the shores of Middle-earth after a terrible storm. Tuor married Idril, Turgon's daughter, and their son was of course Eärendil. Glorfindel fought a balrog and died with it, allowing the Gondolindrim refugees including Tuor, Idril and their son to escape down the the River Sirion to the sea.
> 
> Elladan and Elrohir are Finwëian through Turgon, who was Fingolfin's second son, and also their grandmother Galadriel who was Turgon's cousin, Finarfin's daughter, and go back of course to Finwë, father of Fëanor, Fingolfin and Finarfin. These visions of Fëanor and Fingolfin will be further explored later.


	3. ~ Dark Spring ~

**~ Dark Spring ~**  


~ A winter of war, then spring like childbirth after hard labour. He remembered across the chasm, the circling of his mind about a dark centre, a black stone.

Fell-wolves came down with the snow. They did not enter the forest; there were easier pickings among the homesteads of Men. Thranduil had more ado with the folk of Esgaroth, but some among his folk knew the Northmen about the headwaters of Anduin, and Mirkwood marched out, the King to the East, others North and West. They did not return until mild winds thawed the snow, sent it sliding soft and wet from the pines. The wolves followed winter back into the mountains, and Elves and Men breathed relief with the first hint of spring.

The dead were mourned, and the Elves faded into the sere land, back to their forest like the withdrawing of a wave.

 

“Stay with us a while,” said the one he had fought beside, lovely and deadly. And, with his enticing smile: “Celebrate _Nost-na-Lothion_ with us.”

The day, the night that followed remained in his mind as something glorious, as all the times before, season after season back to the first time. He was not himself, was utterly himself. In the sated aftermath, the voice beckoned him, drew him from sleep. He followed it as one in a dream, still intoxicated by what he had been, the otherness of it. There was no danger from spiders. The creatures never attacked Elves at the time of the Earth-rites.

“It scorches them,” the king told him once, long ago. “Drives them off. The power lingers for days.”

And so he did not fear but because he was a warrior a distant, vigilant part of his mind watched and listened, told over his weapons. He dressed without conscious thought; knew he would be travelling far.

There was a mist among the trees, thin and cool, swirling apart before him and closing after him. He sprang from a walk to the smooth stem of a beech, feeling the sensual reminder of the rite as a sweet, arousing ache.

As he passed from tree to tree soundless, he thought of another time, running from the one whom now, at last, had called him.  
When he paused, returning to the forest floor to drink from a small, secret stream, the day had lengthened to green shadows. He did not linger.

That impassioned journey of day and silver-black night unravelled in his mind like a half-forgotten tale. It took him at last to the edge of the Wood. He knew he was far south, beyond all but the longest patrols, and wariness prickled down his spine. There was a reason the Elves did not live here.  
He was one of the few that had seen Dol Guldur and lived.

A man waited, tall under the spring stars.

There should have been light and fire in his blood at the first touch. When there was only cold, an unlit hearth, the dream that cloaked him ebbed away. His mind began to turn, eddying warily about its centre, the black stone, the knowledge, the fear.

“Follow me,” the man said, and his voice held echoes of the one he loved. The eyes gleamed like warning fires.

That last journey came to him in segments, chips of obsidian that cut and burned. The man (he could not say the name even in his mind, that black stone about which his thoughts turned) spoke to him sometimes. There were whispers of warning like bats flitting about his head, but the man flicked them away with a trace of power. Others came but they were not Men, nor the Houseless. He had felt that unearthly chill, heard the silent scream of souls caught between life and death. The man was at ease with them, and how not? He was their Master.

“I will not hurt thee,” he said once, with a smile so familiar it wounded, and came close. His eyes in the daylight were amethyst, pitiless as a broken vow.   
“I have seen thee in his mind. Thine image is held there like an insect frozen in amber. Knowest thou what thou hast done to him? I think not.” The laughter was light, almost warm. Words and thoughts choked were smothered. He could not call for aid, could not lead any-one to the place that waited for him, and he was glad of it.

The forest sank into gloom, the trees crowded close, their trunks oozing vomitous clots of pale fungi. A dank mist sighed from the earth. He tasted rotting metal on his tongue. When the towers and sharp, hard walls soared out of the trees like a prince shedding a beggar's cloak, he halted, and through the miasma uttered a soundless cry.

And woke.

The man who was no man sat beside him. In the small chamber his presence was more than physical; a gathering of ancient power into a form that burned reality. It hurt the eye to look upon him.

“Elgalad Meluion.” The complex tones shivered against the stone, echoed back, repeating his name in whispers. There was no moisture in his mouth, but there was water, a whisper of it behind the walls.

_Underground. No windows. I remember..._

But then, his lord had come for him.

Elgalad sat up, and the stone was damp against his flesh though a brazier burned. The man passed it; fuming coals reflected in his eyes.

All the waters of his mind plunged into that place Elgalad had not been able to approach, spread ice through his blood, his limbs. He saw the edifices of an inhuman mind made of fire and steel and music. He saw a ring of fire, heard a beloved voice speaking.  
 _I have told thee of Mordor and its Lord, Sauron. He owns me, binds my soul to his. I am his slave._

In the heart of the fire danced visions shown to him long ago.

_Go, my dear._ Run!

And he had run, sick and anguished. The anguish remained, but the years had fashioned it into fury. His hissed like a wildcat, and sprang from the bed.

A net of cold iron enwrapped him, each web burrowing into his flesh...

He blinked, his cheek against something soft, musky: a wolf's pelt spread on the stone flags. A pair of boots came into his vision, and a hand clenched in his hair.  
“That was foolish. Thou canst not hurt me, but I can surely hurt thee. Get up.”

Elgalad shook the pain aside, gathered himself and power slapped him again, raining sparks down across his eyes. When he floated to the surface of the black pit, only his thoughts had strength.  
 _He called to me. I came to_ him.

“Of course,” the voice agreed. “Thou wouldst not have come to me.” He inclined his head toward a jug and wine-cup. “Drink.”

That smile again. Elgalad breathed, pushed himself up, defying weakness and fear. Sauron stepped to the table, lifted a cup and held it to his mouth.  
“Red Harvest. Drink.”

Elgalad swallowed. The wine was autumn-rich. He thought of the feasts, of the fey nights of the Earth-rites, and did not think he would ever know them again. Another breath and he willed himself to look at the beautiful face. Knots tightened in his gut, bound the panicked thunder of his heart.

“He is very clever, but his hate and fear blind him,” Sauron spoke conversationally. “He feared I would kill thee, but thou art more useful to me alive.” He touched a fingertip to the corner of Elgalad's mouth, dabbed a spilled drop of wine and sucked it slowly. Through racking shudders, Elgalad fought to hold himself still. Sauron laughed softly, moved away. He was robed in deep purple, slit to show the stride of long legs clad in black breeches and doeskin boots. A belt of silver enamelled in vivid colours girdled his slim hips. His hair was drawn over one shoulder in a loose braid that fell to his knees. The single lamp showed it silver-gold.  
“I had to wait for the time when thy mind was unguarded, ripe for suggestion.” He sat gracefully as an Elf. Evil should be loathsome, uncouth, it was not, and that one fact dislocated Elgalad's mind.

“Thou knowest naught,” Sauron said, an elder chiding a youth. “I am Maia.” He lifted both hands, and Elgalad saw that he possessed four fingers on each. But that was impossible. With a hard, harsh smile, the Dark Lord spoke a word that cracked against the walls, and the illusion was gone. Three fingers.  
“What is real, and what is not?” he wondered, and the fair hair filled with colour like a spill of ink, eyes darkened to violet as the bones of the face shifted. Elgalad’s lord sat before him, the side of his mouth quirked in mockery.  
“How sure art thou, Meluion, that he was real?”

Groping, his breath gone to nothing, Elgalad summoned the will to shake his head, and his mind screamed in abhorrence: _No!_

“Vanimórë,” Sauron said. “His name is Vanimórë. He never even told thee that.” Cradling Elgalad's chin gently in one hand, he leaned closer. His eyes held complexities, patterns like snowflakes, wisdom and pain, cruelty that weighed and balanced itself. “Oh, he is real enough. Thou lovest him. And he...he will do anything to save thee, as he thinks, from me.”

Elgalad could not form words. For so long he had longed to see this face, but the soul behind the violet eyes was alien. It was a sensation like falling.

“Be patient, thou wilt see him soon. He is coming, but he will not know thou art here until I reveal thee.” His teeth showed, very white. “His reaction will be memorable.”  
He drew his hand away. Elgalad heard words in his mind and knew, through the dark burn of them, that he was meant to hear them, to understand.

_Go. I need to be sure no-one traces him. Ensure they do not._

Úlairi. He was sending the Úlairi.

The ring of fire circled his mind, closed like a fist. His last cries were burned to ash.

Sauron regarded him.  
 _Thy weakest link , my son. And I can see why, but I wonder if thou knowest him at all? And he certainly does not know thee, does he? But I wonder if it would even matter to him?_  
In Vanimórë's mind, Elgalad was young, an innocent beauty desperate for his love. He still was, that was clear to see, as was the strange innocence that went deeper than the glorious (Oh, truly glorious) sexual rites that the wood-Elves engaged in.  
( _And knowest thou of those, my son? Art thou imagining him as a virgin?)_

Smiling to himself, Sauron raised his head sensing the approach of the _Peredhil_ and of Vanimórë, who would find his hands tied more securely than they ever were in the steel shackles of Barad-dûr.

~~~

The folk of Alphgarth were the last to arrive for the council, living furthest from the halls and, as was custom, Thranduil came to the gates while his son walked on to greet the prince. Alphgarth was of the Wood and loyal to Thranduil but, the last of the Greenwood's fiefdoms to survive the encroaching Shadow, it retained a definite, and very ancient autonomy.

Relations between Prince Bainalph and Thranduil were courteous and cold. As a youth, Legolas had wondered why; he himself was fond of the prince. When he grew older, he guessed. There was, on the rare times they met, simply too much heat between his father and Bainalph, but it was heat that ran under a river of ice. Something had happened once, and it lay on them like a wizard's spell.

On this warm day, the tiered fans of beech-leaves scattering a light as gold and green as Bainalph's eyes, he walked out to greet Alphgarth with a smile.

Bainalph dismounted light as drifting blossom. His entourage followed, and prince bowed to prince, then to king. White as the swans that gave him his name, his hair was woven into scores of thin braids twined with amber beads. A fringe of silver chains flowed down his forehead, and a teardrop of malachite hung between his brows. On the pink-and-white of one high cheekbone a finely-drawn tattoo of three raven feathers showed stark. When he smiled, dimples sparked beside a tempting mouth, which he offered to be kissed, and Legolas had no hesitation in accepting. Bainalph tasted of honey.

“Be welcome, Prince Bainalph, in the name of the king, and in the name of the Wood.”

“Alphgarth is pleased to come.” Bainalph responded, the appreciation he never tried to conceal vivid in those heavy-lashed eyes. Legolas, who had dressed with care, binding his hair in the same fashion, could not acquit himself of a desire to impress. He was amused at himself. Bainalph had that effect on one, and whatever Thranduil's thoughts, he too had met the challenge of beauty.

“I had hoped to entertain you at Alphgarth,” Bainalph said, flirtatious. Legolas felt the snap of anger from his father, and the luscious smile deepened. Flashing remarkable eyes toward the king, Bainalph held his look for a moment, before his lashes dropped. The sweet, drowsy air sharpened as it always did when Thranduil and the prince of Alphgarth came within a league of one another. One could drink the intoxication like heady wine. The king wore ivy-green. His crown was his hair; half its wealth coiled about his brow, starred with blue and white flowers. White gems from far-off lands flashed and flickered in nests of gold, and silver chains depended from temple to shoulder. Legolas saw, as he always did, the roused flame in his father that longed to scorch, the swooning need in Bainalph.

Legolas had participated in the Alphgarth’s Earth-rites when he was young. He thought the king, preoccupied with his own Midsummer ritual, would not notice his absence, but Thranduil knew everything that touched his people, and when Legolas returned, he was more than furious. Legolas had never seen is father thus. And he learned, then, the history behind his father's antipathy toward Bainalph. The poison of thousands of years spilled from Thranduil that day.

The basic facts were that Thranduil had married to form an alliance when his father first came to the forest. Oropher, whom had loved his dead wife, would not marry again, even for political reasons. Such unions, however, were common among the woodland tribes and, fortuitously, Oropher had an unwed son. And so Thranduil, who still had dreams of a great love, and knew very well where his proclivities lay, was bonded by blood to a woman he did not know. He had taken his marriage and vows seriously. They would be subject to much scrutiny because his wife was the daughter of a powerful chieftain and, the sexual mores of the Avari notwithstanding, Thranduil, as if to spite himself, had been faithful with all his bitter, thwarted passion.

He believed, he said, over a carafe of wine, that she had felt the same. There was no question of force on either side, simply the expectation that both would do their duty. They had, but the lack of an heir for so long told its own tale. He did not know if she looked aside, had never sought to know. And so it was. Slowly, inexorably, desire slipped away until he felt nothing.

As Oropher's heir, he had been introduced to the wild Earth Rites of the woodland folk, but only as an observer. That was his stony, unbending choice in the face of his marriage, though the elders of the forest warned him he could never truly be one with the Wood until he partook of the rites. So be it. He felt nothing, wanted no-one – until Bainalph, prince of Alphgarth, grew to adulthood.

“And Bainalph was...”

Legolas nodded, watching his father's face as Thranduil stared into his wine. He knew exactly how Bainalph was.

It had been a hard time, those early days when the Greenwood still grieved for the loss of so many on Dagorlad. Bainalph's father, Bainfaron, had been one of them. His mother Uirephíl, wished to seek the West. It had been a vow between them, that if one died before the other they would meet across the Sea. Uirephíl said she would wait until Bainalph attained his majority, but hoped that Thranduil would offer him guidance.

So. So. Bainalph had grown, and Thranduil was not the only one to take him under their wing. The _Ithiledhil_ , the Folk of the Black Moon, a tribe whom had dwelt in Alphgarth before it was ever a principality, had initiated him into their own ancient rites, reputedly darker and wilder than any other. Thranduil did not know. Their chief, Edenel, had told both he and Oropher long ago that unless one took part in the rites, they could not know them, even see them. It was a law, he said, as old as any they had.  
Thranduil would not take that step, not then and at the time he thought, not ever. But Bainalph had, and now bore the raven's wings on his cheek to show his bond with that tribe.

The desire had risen between them like a slow-building storm, and when it broke...

“I visited Alphgarth,” he said. “As I visited all the other lords in the autumn. Later, he came to my chamber. It had been between us for a long time. He should not have come, but I could have turned him away. I did not.”

Legolas was silent, but he moved a hand to lay it upon his father's, felt the tension in his sinews. He was learning things only rumoured until now, overheard. He had never denied himself pleasure, had never needed to.

Bainalph was more than anything he had even dreamed of, Thranduil said after a long silence, and Legolas understood. Bainalph was known to revel in submission, in taking pain. It was not particularly uncommon, though in general warriors enjoyed both submission and domination as the mood and mate took them. But Bainalph's desires ran one way only, and Thranduil, as any-one could see, was a natural dominant.

“I should have told you.”

“Father,” Legolas said patiently. “I am trying to comprehend why you should hate him.”

“I hate myself,” Thranduil flashed. “And seeing him makes it worse. All those years...holding myself apart, was dead to desire. With one look he undid me and gave me everything I had ever wanted.”

“Perhaps it is dangerous to give a man all he has ever wanted.”

“Perhaps it is.”

He had left in the morning without a word to his host, grappling with self-loathing, the revelation of the long night. His wife knew something had happened, he thought, though she said nothing of it. But if anything good had come of his indiscretion it was the return of desire. It was anomalous, undirected, but not long after, the queen bore Legolas.

And then, she had died.

Legolas remembered. He had been young, but the day was gouged in his mind. He did not know why his mother wanted to leave him. Spring had come early, and she had gathered a part together to ride beyond the forest to the north. She had been happy when she left.  
She never came back.

She had ridden and hunted, said those who survived, until capricious winter looked over its shoulder and sent a storm down from the Grey Mountains. With it came wolves, huge beasts, and lead by one even larger, white as the snowfall.

They were no normal wolves, Bainalph said. He himself had been outside the forest with a group of _Ithiledhil_ , and chanced upon the queen's folk. They had fought in the blizzard, amid screams and the spray of blood. When the wolves left, and the snow failed, they had found the queen dead, half dismembered. By the time Thranduil met the survivors, the bodies had fallen to dust. There was nothing left but scraps of cloth and leather stiff with dried blood.

“You think,” Legolas said with difficulty, “that Bainalph let her die.”

“No,” his father refuted. “I do not. But something was at work there, something that punished me for that one night.”

“No,” Legolas murmured. “That is what you want to think. It makes it easier when you believe that night was wrong.”

“It _was_ wrong.” Thranduil rose and paced the chamber. “What then? All that endless time of denial, of continence, of being a prince, then a king, and not even bound to the forest.” He slammed a hand against the wall, bowed his head.

He had changed that after his wife's death, and it was no easy thing for him to become the Summer King, to give himself to any-one who wanted him, binding them to him as the Wood bound him to it. The elders advised him, but could do little more. A shudder ran through him. Legolas knew, he had seen the _Aran Laer_. Even the memory was enough to rouse him. Easier by far the night of the Winter King, on the solstice when Thranduil was the stag, taking whomever he desired. Then, after, Edenel had come to him and he was initiated into the _Ithiledhil._ He became truly the king of the Greenwood.

But there was always guilt, he said, and the long-burning resentment that he had been given no choice in his marriage. He had applied himself to it, wrapped himself in its chains until they choked him of passion, of desire, almost of life. He had loved his father, but Oropher had come to the forest to begin a new life, a simpler one, and the Silvans had no laws against remarriage.

“I felt as if I were a sacrifice to his ambitions,” he confided quietly.

“You were,” Legolas said. “And it was wrong.”

Thranduil raised his head. His eyes softened. “You were not wrong,” he said. “But leave this now, Legolas.” It was a warning. “He should have sent you back.”

“He was deep under the rites, father.”

“Nevertheless.”

Nevertheless. Where does hate go, Legolas wondered. Thranduil did not want to hate his dead wife, who was blameless. He had to hate Bainalph – and himself.

 

Now, he looked into Bainalph's eyes, and said, “I am sure Elgalad represented the king's halls most ably.”

“He is always surprising,” the prince responded. It was true. Elgalad's haunted loveliness was deceptive. He looked as if he would be submissive in sexual encounters and could be, yet on the Earth Days he was another man entirely. He was neither aggressive nor brutal, but there was fierceness in him that only battle or unfettered sex unleashed.

“Where is he?” Legolas asked. He could not see Elgalad’s silver hair among the white and gold of Alphgarth.

“He is not here, then?” Bainalph's voice lost its teasing caress, sounded startled.

A stir of unease fluttered in Legolas belly. “No. When did he leave you?”

“He was gone at sunrise after the celebration. I thought he was coming back here.”

While Elgalad was free to go where he would, as an officer in the king's army, he also had responsibilities. He knew that the king held council after battle, and always after the spring rites. Under normal circumstances he would have been at the halls now, but when news came of the Fell-wolves, Elgalad had asked to go to Alphgarth. Thranduil could field a greater army than Bainalph, and Elgalad felt he would be of more use there. There was no reason for the king to refuse his request.

“You did not see him leave?” Legolas' voice sharpened.

“He was with me, and others most of the night, and gone at dawn.” Bainalph turned to his folk. “Did any of you see Elgalad?”

Heads shook. “No, Sire.”

Legolas had not expected it. Such times were wholly immersive. Elgalad should not have disentangled himself until daybreak, or wanted to. No-one did. He looked back at Bainalph, who said, as if anticipating the question: “Nothing happened that he did not freely embrace.”

While the _Ithiledhil_ were supremely feral on those days, no-one was ever forced. Legolas only gave the thought a passing glance, because he did not want to think of the other reason Elgalad might vanish without a word.

_If_ he _called, Elgalad would go._

And at such times one who meant no harm might enter the forest. The magic of the Earth-rites would repel only evil or unfriends.

“Come.” He took Bainalph's arm.

~~~

“Has he said anything of his guardian?” The king's face had gone still.

“Nothing to me, not for a long time.” Legolas glanced at Bainalph, whose head moved once in the negative. “But he is there, in Elgalad's soul, in his eyes.”

“I know.” Thranduil rose abruptly, paced across to Bainalph. His eyes were the icy blue of winter, but winter was never so cold.  
“Are you losing your charm?” He near spat the words. “If he was with you, how could you let him go?”

“I slept, as we all did, as I am sure _you_ did.” The prince did not sound offended, but his eyes darkened to emerald. “And we do not have time for recriminations.”

The king's lips tightened. He went to the door and opened it, issuing orders.  
“You,” he turned his head to Bainalph, “Send messages to Alphgarth, have them look for any sign of his passing.” They all knew a search was unlikely to yield anything unless Elgalad had paused to build a fire; even then every warrior was taught to conceal it.

“The last time,” Legolas said. “His guardian came to the east, to Esgaroth.” He inwardly upbraided himself for never learning more, but Elgalad closed up like a flower at nightfall when the strange _Golodh_ was mentioned. There was a part of him that never ceased to grieve at his separation, and Legolas would not deliberately touch that wound.

“I have directed a patrol to Esgaroth; the townsfolk may have seen something.” His father walked to a table and poured wine. The tension between he and Bainalph was, for the moment, thinned by mutual concern for Elgalad.

“He is not bound to the Wood,” Bainalph said. “He is already bound to his _Golodh._ If he has chosen, we have no right to pursue him.”

“But he would not leave without telling us.” Legolas’ unease was running stronger now. “We have been too close. Father?”

Thranduil raised a brow at Bainalph.  
“A shade-speaker rode with you.”

“Gwathel, yes.” And: “You know I will not command her.”

“Neither would I,” the king said. “ _Ask.”_

~~~

Legolas followed his father out of the gates, into the mild green afternoon. Where the hill shouldered the forest aside, a grove of apple trees grew. It had been here when Oropher first came, an old, peaceful place where nightingales sang in the dark. A spring, little more than a glimmer of water, slid down the mossy rocks and vanished into the grass. Thranduil unbuckled his belt. As the land took him naked, he came naked to the land. He offed the fine linen, milk-soft doeskin, the jewelled chains. The muscular leanness of his body both contrasted and complimented the gemmed and flowered hair. It was a dangerous, beautiful creature who drew a dagger from the discarded belt. The clothes and hair were ceremonial, but no weapon carried in the Wood was other than deadly.

“Remember,” he said.

Legolas was not to interfere. His skin tightened, the roots of his hair pricking as if the air were heavy with the threat of lightning. As many times as he had seen his father perform this rite, granted to him by the power of his kingship and binding to the Wood, Legolas was awed, a little afraid. What Thranduil was about to do was perilous, but so was he.

_Nan Dungortheb,_ he thought, _Where the sorcery of Sauron and the power of Melian came together, and horror and madness walked._ **  
Thranduil had not been born when Melian the Maia was queen of Doriath, but Oropher had. The Elvenking's power over the Wood was not so different, and where it clashed with the shadow in Dol Guldur the land...warped. Legolas' breath backed behind his teeth as his father drew the blade across the palm of his hand. Red drops fell into the spring.

_Blood to the waters of the Earth._

The king knelt, and now his eyes did not see Legolas; he looked further, deeper. He thrust his hand to the wrist into the turf. Grass and soil parted like water.

_Blood to the Earth._

Every midsummer the king gave himself to the Wood, abdicating ego and all that he was for his realm and his folk. It was this sacrifice even more than the weapons of the Elves that allowed them to remain in the forest that was now called Mirkwood. The power that challenged Thranduil was inhuman and ancient, but so was the forest. The rite of the _Aran Laer_ took all, but it gave back as much. Legolas, who knew just how high a price his father paid, watched as the Earth-wind burst from the ground, lifting the king's hair. Thranduil's power delved down, a questing intelligence like a hundred roots seeking water, and Elgalad's name whispered through them. The tendrils paused, gathered into one that sped south. Legolas could see nothing, but he knew that his father's consciousness became the wood, roots, loam, underground streams. If Elgalad were within the king's purview, Thranduil would feel him.

The wind dropped, fell away to stillness, and the silence threatened like a massing storm. The earth quivered. Thranduil spat forth one word, another, stringing it to a chant as old as the first Elves who walked this forest. His face wore strain like a glassy shield. Resistance. It had happened before.  
“He is very strong.” His voice was muted, the voice of the leaves. A light rain began to fall.

He.  
Dol Guldur.

Legolas' stomach turned over. “He has Elgalad.”

Thranduil looked at him. Humanity was easing back into his eyes, and with it, fear.

“This has never happened before,” Legolas said, and the mild night was cold as the Black Winter in his bones.

~~~

Gwathel was white-haired as all the _Ithiledhil._ Her eyes, dark to black, dominated her narrow face, and possessed a disturbing double focus.  
Alone among the wood-Elves, the Moon-folk spoke to the Houseless. The spirits of the dead loved their land and would not leave it, but they yearned for form, even those who sung the Soul Song at death. Those whom had not been granted that blessing might attempt to enter the bodies of the living, seize it for their own. Only the strongest could win such a battle and the possessed, with few exceptions, were driven to madness. They slew themselves or forced others to, became Houseless in their turn. If the Houseless triumphed, were subtle enough, it was said that no-one knew. Thus the dead were shunned by all but the _Ithiledhil._ But since the darkness, shade-speaking had become perilous. Those who died in battle against the Dark were predators, famished ghosts. Patrols beyond the Old Forest Roads were increasingly rare, and Thranduil forbade the shade speakers to touch the souls of those who haunted Dol Guldur.

The king waited in the apple grove with Legolas. Like Bainalph, they had offed their ceremonial robes, bound their hair in loose ropes. They were not alike, father and son, but in the last light, they shone like torches. Thranduil’s hair was old-gold. Legolas’ was primrose, brushed through with milk-white.

“Dol Guldur has Elgalad.” Thranduil said the words like an accusation.   
Bainalph felt wings of blood flutter in his veins. He said harshly, denying: “How is it possible?”

“I know not, but _He_ stands in the way of my seeking,” the king snapped.

“Gwathel?”

She bowed her head to the king, sat in one fluid movement, and crossed her legs. There was no visible preparation. Slipping her fingers into the loam, she gazed south, and Bainalph knew that for her there was no forest, no rivers, no distance, no _here_ , nor _there._ There was only the Houseless. It was easier, the shade-speakers said, at dawn and dusk, the in-between times, the margins.  
The pupils of her eyes enlarged. Her lips shaped words only the dead could hear. Bainalph stood beside her but neither he nor Thranduil or Legolas could help her as she sought the souls that had been claimed by Dol Guldur.  
She did not need their aid.  
“I have known Elgalad,” she had said. “It will make it easier.”

Easier...she had described it once as the way a dove flies to elude hawks. Bainalph could not even tell her to be careful. But she would not be entirely alone. There were Houseless who had died clean, whose souls were bound to the wood. They chose to fight even after death, forming a ghostly guard around Dol Guldur. It was these souls Gwathel hoped to speak with.  
Her breath drew in and hid in her throat.

Bainalph watched her face, white against the white hair as the dusk seeped in, and thought of the beloved dead who could never come back, forever and forever. The _Golodhrim_ believed in rebirth if a soul passed to the West, but the reborn could never return to Middle-earth. Only a heart of ice and stone could impose such a law. Silvan legends spoke of Tauron, the Wild Hunter, and the Sindar knew of the _Belain_ through those who had fought in the war of Wrath. The tales were not comforting. The folk of the Wood were of the Earth, children of the Mother and the One. They could never be parted from their land. Bainalph knew that if he died, he too would bind himself to the forest as the Houseless did. Forever and forever.

On the edge of perception voices whispered, lamented. Expressions flitted over Gwathel's face as she took the light of her living soul to the dead.   
Her brows twitched in consternation.  
“ _Golodhrim_?” she said aloud.

A breeze caressed the blossoms; their scent was bliss, but under it was an iron tang as of worked forges. Gwathel came to her feet. She lifted a hand, flecks of earth clinging to her fingers, and traced a rune in the air. The wind gusted sharp, hard _Metalblossomblood,_ and died. A storm of petals fell.

“Elgalad lives.” Gwathel spoke carefully. “But he is surrounded by darkness and fire.” Her eyes regained focus, intent black wells. “He followed a call. And there were others, two _Peredhil_ ; twins.”  
She moved to the spring, drank, let fall a stream to the grass. “They came from the south. Red and white flames. One carried a sword that sang ancient blood. They went into Dol Guldur, but they too, live.”

The only _Peredhil_ living dwelt in Imladris. Thranduil had nothing to do with the northern valley, but he was not ignorant. It was known that the twin sons of Elrond Eärendilion visited their grandmother in Lothlórien at times.  
“Alone?” he asked.

“Yes. They followed orcs. And there is another. The Houseless have seen him before. Of the Dark and not, a man who comes and goes freely to Dol Guldur.”

Bainalph heard Legolas' hard indrawn breath. “Whom,” he said. “called Elgalad?”

“Gorthaur.”

The trees shivered. Names were power.

“He would not go with Gorthaur.”

“And yet,” Gwathel said. “he did.”

“Why would he want Elgalad?” the king demanded. “If he wished to kill him, why take him to Dol Guldur?”

“They did not know.” She brushed a hand across her face as if trying to clear cobwebs.

“We know what he does with the dead.” Twinned wrath and pain lay deep in Thranduil's eyes.  
He had led an attack on Dol Guldur once, and had come to know the brutal, hopeless waste of it. The air was poison; warriors were lead astray, minds gone to mist. Strength leached from them and they fell to orc arrows or to nothing visible.

Bainalph said: “Gorthaur called him, but Elgalad _heard_ some-one else, some-one he trusted. By the time he discovered the truth, it would be too late.” And, watching Thranduil's face, “You know we cannot leave him. I will go.”

The king wheeled on him. “You will not!”

Bainalph's blood flowed thick and hot as spiced honey at his touch, the anger in it. “You will not do _naught._ ”

“And what will _you_ do save walk into the mists and be lost as a hundred others have been lost?”

“Elgalad is alive, and the _Peredhil_ This is a new thing. Perhaps I will not be lost. He may be taking hostages.”

“He could have taken any of our people if a hostage was what he wanted,” Legolas said.

Thranduil's hard grip loosed, dropped. “Elgalad.” He turned toward his son.  
“Elgalad, whom cannot be bound to the Wood, was not born of it…”

“It was Elgalad he wanted,” Bainalph said.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Bainfaron - Beautiful hunter.  
> ** From The Silmarillion.  
> Moon-elf--Ithiledhel  
> Moon-elves--Ithiledhil  
> Gwaith-en-Ithilvorn: People of the Black Moon
> 
> I would like to thank Neylo Russandol and Marchwriter on the Lizard Council for their help in translating Folk of the Black Moon into Sindarin. I appreciate it very much.
> 
> Note: I have Bainalph in this, just with a different story, since it's not fair to any-one who reads the other stories to keep telling the same one.
> 
> The Earth-rite of the Aran Laer (the Summer King) is in Magnificat of the Damned II, but for any-one who has not read, I think I give a hint of what happens.
> 
> Edit: 08/08/14 - I have changed Bainalph's story to bring it in line with Magnificat. I feel it does not need to be any different.


	4. ~ Storm-Song ~

~ Elrohir laughed, heard it shatter against the walls, a fierce, bright sound.  
“ _Never,_ ” he stated as the echoes died away, flattened by the brooding stone. Elladan's fingers tightened on his arm.  
  
”I admire thy defiance.” In contrast, Vanimórë's voice was mild as summer. “So will he. And it will avail thee naught.”  
  
“Are you his proxy?”  
  
“I do not believe his proxy would help thee.”  
  
Elrohir laid his hand over Elladan's, and the tight grip loosed a little.  
  
“There is a way out.” Vanimórë walked into the room where Elrohir had awoken. His voice came back to them: “Fashioned by the Elves who built this place.”  
  
Elrohir said, “This goes too easy for me.”  
  
“And for me,” his brother said.  
  
“What choice do you have?” Vanimórë spoke from the doorway. “Come.” He wrung out lengths of cloth in a basin of water. The scent of pungent herbs rose from it. “Tie these around thy faces; the cloth will absorb some of the poison in the air, at least until thou art in cleaner parts. My men wear these. If thou art seen, perhaps thou wilt be taken for one of them.” He lifted two packs. “There is a water flask. Do not drink from any streams until thou art far from here. And some food.”  
  
“Where are the prisoners?” Elrohir did not move.  
  
“There are none,” Vanimórë said. “None you can save.” He looked into Elrohir's eyes, then Elladan's. “I do not lie.”  
  
“You serve a master of lies.”  
  
Expression shivered across Vanimórë's face for an instant, then it became smooth as enamel.  
“Listen to me. It is well nigh impossible to _control_ most Elves, as thou knowest, most would die rather than submit to Sauron, yes? And they do. Why think'st thou he is called the Necromancer?” He threw the packs at them. “There are souls, not in the tower; they fear him, but in the woods. And they cannot be freed.”  
  
A sensation like gelid ice dripped down Elrohir's spine. He had caught the pack without thinking, let it hang from his hand. He said, “We did not come here to do _nothing._ ”  
  
“And what wilt thou do?” Vanimórë stepped close to him. “Or art thou thinking that Lúthien brought down the walls of Tol-in-Gaurhoth with song? Strong though thou art, thou canst not do that.”  
  
He was right. Lúthien had been Melian's daughter; neither Elrohir nor Elladan's Maia blood was as rich in power. But Elrohir had never run from anything in his life save the rot of guilt in his soul. He slanted a look at his brother, saw the fine jaw set firm. And perhaps this was the way for Elrohir at least, to make some reparation.  
  
 _But not for Elladan._  
  
 _Do not,_ his brother said, catching the end of his thought. _Even think of it. We do not part company._  
  
“What would you do if you entered an enemy's fortress?” Elrohir threw at Vanimórë, who snapped: “This is no brigand or Orc-chieftain's lair.”  
  
“No, indeed.” Elrohir's smile felt like blood on his mouth. He extended Aícanaro. “Take us to him.”  
  
Brilliant, angry eyes flicked from him to Elladan.  
“Thou canst not know what he will do to thee.”  
  
“That is not the issue,” Elladan said. “We cannot leave without facing him. Do you understand?”  
  
In one blurred movement, Vanimórë swept the basin from its stand. It struck the wall, splashed its contents across the wall, and fell with a clang.  
“Thou think'st this is some tale of legend, and thou art the heroes?” he blazed. “That he is weak because he dwells here, and not in Mordor? He blows dust in thine eyes, all of thee. He will bind thee, and use the love between thee to control thee.”  
  
Elrohir knew this for the truth. It would be so easy.  
“Nevertheless.”  
  
Vanimórë looked from one to the other, and his beautiful mouth thinned.  
“Thou art both crazed,” he said, disbelief in his tone. “Thou wilt give Sauron two supremely dangerous weapons to use against thine own people.”  
  
“Perhaps,” Elrohir said. “And perhaps not. Not all are weak-minded.”  
Glorfindel had never said Vanimórë was weak, but how else to explain that one who looked so strong was bound to the Dark?  
  
“Brother,” Elladan warned.  
  
“Fool! Thou wilt be enslaved as I am.”  
  
“Jealous?” Elrohir goaded. “Will your especial place as his slave be threatened? Perhaps he will not need you. Glorfindel said you longed for freedom. This may be your chance. He also said he believed _you_ were Sauron's greatest weapon, not the One Ring. I do not. You are a nothing, a slave, a coward who fears to leave his master. _Now take us to him._ ”  
  
Vanimórë laughed. Elrohir was disappointed. There should be more to this man, but it seemed there was only glitter without substance. And then he realized where his acid came from: Vanimórë was Sauron's slave. One did not disbelieve Glorfindel, whom had seen suffering in the man's soul. But Vanimórë should be broken as Celebrian had been. She was Galadriel's daughter, but that had not saved her. She had been was destroyed as surely as if the orcs had killed her in that cave. If Vanimórë had known rape and torment, _where were the signs_? How could he stand there with such poise?  
  
“Take us,” Elrohir repeated.  
  
“Think what this will do to thy father,” Vanimórë said. “To thy people.”  
  
“And what would your own father think, if he knew you served the Dark for Age upon Age, and made no effort to challenge it?”  
  
The indigo eyes froze to blankness. Vanimórë stood still, then whirled to the door and flung it open.  
  


~~~

  
  
Sauron, seated in what had once been Oropher's hall of audience, settled back in the great chair, and looked toward the double doors.  
Huge fire-bowls marched in a double line toward the dais, but no light reached into the deep recess behind the throne, where the bronze statue of Melkor brooded in a deliberate darkness. It ever felt cold on Sauron's shoulders, a seep of nothingness, which made this chair an uncomfortable place to sit. He did not pray to the darkest god, nor hope for his return, rather the opposite — Melkor had no plan for the world but its ultimate destruction. But Sauron well knew what his former master was capable of, and a Power did not forget. Nor would Melkor reside in the Everlasting Dark forever; a dying Elf had prophesied his return long ago, and Sauron had heard the truth in the words. Thus these temples. At whiles he sacrificed prisoners. Vanimórë would dance naked between the pillars against which were bound a motley array of Men and Orcs, and his blades would open their throats. It was little enough.  
  
He was delighted with the Peredhil twins defiance, but not surprised. Vanimórë had hoped to guide them out when the narcotic fumes still lingered, as Sauron knew he would. Now he approached the hall in a dark mood, but this was the very course he would himself had taken. Yet he would not be Vanimórë were he considering how he could aid the twins escape once they realized what their courageous and foolish plan entailed. And thus, Elgalad.  
  
He glanced down at the kneeling figure. The Elf's shoulders were tense, and shivers fleeted through him, running into the slender chain affixed to the collar about his throat. It chimed faintly. He wore only a simple tunic that left arms and legs bare. Nudity did not trouble the wood-Elves, so displaying him unclad would neither have embarrassed nor humiliated him, but might have driven Vanimórë into uncontrollable fury. Sauron could control it, but his attention would be focused on the two _Peredhil_. He wanted Vanimórë shocked, no more.  
  
He flexed the chain in his hand, enough for Elgalad to feel the tightening links. In fact the chain could have no more held the Elf than could a cobweb. Sauron had seen prisoners use them to strangle their orc captors. No, it was Elgalad's fear of what Sauron would do to his 'beloved lord' that provided the true chain.  
  
“He showed you,” he had said when Elgalad woke again, and tilted up his chin to look into the rain-grey eyes. “He showed you something of his torment to scare you, and it did. It should have. But if you show sense, I will not hurt either of you. You are both guarantees of each other's co-operation. For a time.”  
  
Elgalad understood, though he said nothing. He would not attempt to escape.  
  
“Your long impatience is about to be rewarded,” Sauron murmured.  
  
The Elf's profile was pearl, the sheet of hair loose, spread like silk-floss behind him. This time the quiver that shook him was not of fear, but of yearning. The long lashes dropped. He was extraordinarily beautiful, a deep-buried strength in him. Sauron wondered if his son had ever recognized what lay under the loveliness.  
  
The doors swung inward. Elgalad rose on his knees, as if pulled by an external force. His lips parted.  
  
Vanimórë strode in ahead of the _Peredhil_ , his face expressionless. And then expression came into it, exploded like a furnace behind his eyes. For one instant he halted, and then he ran. Elgalad bolted to his feet, reaching out. Sauron held up his hand, and the chain drew taut. Elgalad's hand flew to his throat as he reached the limits of his freedom, and Vanimórë stopped dead on the bottom step.  
  
“You know, ” Sauron said to him alone. “How we play this game. Do not interfere, and he will come to no harm.”  
  
Vanimórë's wrath poured from him like heat from a lava-flow.  
 _I do not believe thee!_  
  
 _You have no choice._  
  
A heartbeat of time had passed, and in that the _Peredhil_ had gathered themselves. Star-coloured eyes drank the flames, burned liked crystals. Their souls had a distinctive flavour: the cold blue song of the Ainur, the white heat of the Finwions, and the there-and-gone torch of Mortals, but there was nothing Mortal in their beauty or the way they moved, swords out, burning white and blood-red. They meant to attack him. How brave. How expected. How quaint.  
  
Vanimórë span, and their blades cracked against his in showers of sparks. The space before the dais became a battleground, and Sauron allowed it. He wanted to see for himself how well Elrond's sons fought.  
The swords met, disengaged in a storm of attack and riposte. The _Peredhil_ could fight in tandem without fouling one another; Vanimórë knew how to fight more than one enemy, and his purpose now was to keep the twins from the dais. There were lands where Men would pay fortunes to see such a display of swordsmanship from these three.  
  
Sauron called the Nazgûl in. They stood in the shadows, away from the fire they feared, but their presence was like rotted ice against the skin, and Sauron saw it clamp about the _Peredhil_. They did not allow it to detract from their concentration, which showed strength, but Sauron already knew they were uncommon. He rose, drew Elgalad to him, and said through the clashing tangle of steel: “Enough.”  
  
Vanimórë disengaged and stepped back, arms outstretched, the blades forming the bar of his intentions. The twins eyes moved past him to Elgalad, a stranger to them, but their hesitation showed that they knew he was a hostage, and Sauron did not think that they would deliberately put his life at risk. He was right.  
“Vengeance calls you, you would say, but first, _you will listen._ ”  
  
Their swords screamed, a high, maddening sound, Anguirel recognized Sauron, whom had reforged it. It _smoked._  
  
Sauron gathered fire from the bowls, slammed it down before them, a barrier they could not pass without injury.  
“Now,” he said, “You will listen.”  
  
For a moment, their minds raged against him, then Elrohir's head snapped toward his brother as one called from a distance. They communicated on some deep level that Sauron could not hear, and he did not like that fact. Twins shared bonds that went deeper even than blood-ties. It was almost uncanny to see how their fury was leashed by that silent exchange.  
  
Sauron returned to his seat, knowing what they saw, how it differed from what they had expected. The first impression was important, could throw an adversary off-balance. The _Peredhil_ had expected a monster, the armed Dark Lord of Orodruin, encased in steel. That was a truth, but it was not the only truth. What they saw now was a man of Elven looks, very fair, and robed like a king. A bound Elf stood beside him, but he was unharmed.  
  
He spoke, pitched his voice to the inner Music he remembered. The fire-bowls went out in a procession of darkness that marched toward the dais, left only the two torchiére that flanked the throne.  
The tale danced in those flames. Sauron showed them an Ainu playing with infinity, eager to learn, to work his own visions into reality. That Maia, Mairon, was drawn to Melkor's power and beauty (Yes, he was beautiful then, and for long after) his desire to shape and order.  
  
The hall faded as Time wove across it, vivid, glorious, then plummeted into the dread grandeur of Utumno. Sauron showed the _Peredhil_ glimpses of Melkor's might and cruelty that went so far beyond physical torment. He ousted one's own ego, one's sense of self. He became all, considered those in his service as vessels for his will, as slaves, told them they were nothing more. Sauron had clung to to his pride, his knowledge that he was himself, had worth and a mind that could exist beyond Melkor's crushing shadow. He could never allow himself to forget it, in Utumno, in Angband, whose titan red-lit halls opened around them. Vanimórë shifted. This was too close for him.  
  
 _It is too close for me, also, but necessary._  
  
This was not something he had shared even with his son, perhaps especially not with his son. Vanimórë saw only what he wanted to, and it did not suit Sauron to have him struggle with an alien sympathy. The twins were different. They could not be cowed by fear, although he strung that theme around the edges of his tale, brief glimpses of their home burned, of rapine, of the populace impaled on spears, crucified, dismembered. The _Peredhil_ imagined such things themselves, so the merest suggestion was necessary. He showed himself as a man trapped by a greater power, and mistrusted forever after.  
  
Angband rocked, pillars fell like a forest of basalt as the Valar attacked, until finally a sky at war with itself opened over the ruins, lit the slaughter. The devastation was true enough. If the _Peredhil_ had believed the fall of Angband a routing of demons and orcs they were in error; many thousands of Men had died in the Great Defeat. Then came a time of flight with a band of weary men and orcs, and the founding of Mordor.  
  
Now came Ost-in-Edhil, a more difficult interweaving of truth and untruth. Sauron had never wanted to destroy the Elves. That was the truth. He had more in common with them than short-lived Men, but he had (and did) desire to control them. And there was the lie he must conceal.  
There was no altruism in his forging of the One Ring but it was meant, among other things, to protect the Elves, to wean them from the insidious pull of the West. Melkor had proved that some, though not all, Elves could be controlled. A few had walked under his shadow until death or the fall of Angband released them. Sauron's duel with Finrod Felagund had been an experiment which failed. He wanted to control the Noldo, though he had not known he held the erstwhile King of Nargothrond, not then, only that the Elf was mighty. Finrod had fallen only because he did not believe the song he sang in defence. It fell about his feet like rotted brocade that looks beautiful, but will tear at a touch.  
  
Sauron had not for meant Finrod to die in Tol-in-Gaurhoth. His werewolves had been ordered to slay all but he. Finrod had wrestled with the one sent to kill the Man later known to be Beren son of Barahir, and so died. Neither had he meant to torture Celebrimbor, or for Ost-in-Edhil to fall. If the Noldor had accepted him, they would not now be a fading people confined to hidden valleys and grey sea-shores. Celebrimbor's defiance had unleashed Sauron's rare rage, and blazed it into war. He could not hide that fact from the _Peredhil_ , whose own father had fought in Eregion, and he heard their minds as they flung his actions back at him.  
 _You killed, you tortured and maimed. Eregion was laid waste._  
  
Yes, so it had been, but Sauron's own sense of betrayal was as great.  
  
Scorn. _How could it be? You hid your identity from the first, deceiver._  
  
 _Because no Elf would trust one whom had served Melkor._  
  
 _Their mistrust was warranted!_  
  
 _If you tell a man he cannot be trusted, in time he will prove it to thee._  
Mistrust, betrayal, death were part of an old tale, no Mortal nor Power escaped it, and grief came in its wake as dusk follows the setting sun.  
  
Númenor was easier. Sauron despised those half-Men, half-Elves, neither one nor the other, grown bloated with too much wealth and power. _They_ would have ruled the world and enslaved the Elves, hating what they could not possess: immortality. Sauron had destroyed them, and for that was forced to meet the arrayed might of the Last Alliance. He had no choice but to defend when attacked, when his country was invaded. He gave them Gil-galad's death, for he had not dealt the High King his fatal wounds, and he omitted the vision of himself stepping upon the shattered body.  
  
He showed them nothing of Vanimórë, the judicious and sometimes crude brutality he used to fashion that weapon. His son was not their concern.  
  
The song drew in upon itself. Many mistakes had been made, Sauron said, on both sides, but he was not the greatest enemy. Mortals were the scourge that would at last drive the Elves into the West, or into dark forests, ever-shrinking as Men hewed them for timber.  
  
The _Peredhil's_ eyes shone brighter than the flames. Sauron dissolved the barriers around them.  
  
“Why would I want you as my enemies?” He smiled. “We share the same blood.”  
  
And he brought down his power like a hammer. They staggered under its weight, and the floor of the hall groaned. Dust sifted down. Elgalad's chain chimed a warning. Sauron reached into the time before Time for what he had been, what he was.  
  
So near the Dark, the Void, where power turns in upon itself...  
  
The twins fought to stay on their feet, the cords of their throat tight as steel. Sauron set his jaw, felt sweat break ice-cold on his forehead.  
  
 _Too near._  
  
The Nazgûl screamed, and there was abject terror in the sound. It struck the ears like shreds of rusted metal.  
  
“You stand behind your power, and your slaves, and talk of peace?” Elrohir cried through the tumult. His sword was fire, casting his face into a mask of polished bronze.  
“ _Coward_!”  
  
On Sauron's spike of fury, the light vanished. There was nothing, no sense of form. It was cold beyond physical cold, black as a closed tomb. He thought of those times his body had been destroyed, when he had skirted the edge of the Void, and heard Melkor's laughter. Anger became terror. To skim energy from the Void was like drinking from a river in full flood; the slightest misstep, and it would drag one in. Once it had not been so. The Ainur had known of the Void, and Melkor had walked there, as had Sauron. It was not absence, as some thought, nor a pit of unbeing; indeed it possessed its own energy, thus 'Void' was a misnomer. But it was the opposite of form, of the living matter of Arda, and the Valar had made it a prison for Melkor and the Ainur who served him. It had long been perilous to touch that source of immense power. Sauron rarely did so, but he was not as strong since the One Ring was taken from him, so had essayed it with great caution, a sip, a drop. It was difficult to assimilate into matter, (Melkor had deemed it unusable to a physical incarnation) and opened a chink between the world and the Void.  
  
 _Too close..._  
  
The twins scorn had pricked him as deep as Celebrimbor's. Too many had called him a coward. He had forgotten to be wary. A sucking emptiness yawned behind him, dragged at his hair.  
  
Strong hands caught his arm and Vanimórë _threw_ him down the steps. Sauron released Elgalad's chain, landed on gritty stone, and pushed himself to his feet. The hall shook, a pillar cracked with a sound like a great whip.  
  
The torchiéres went out, and a fire-bowl sprang into life, unlit save at times of ceremony, it clawed blood-red over the bronze statue of Melkor. Light moved in the jet eye-sockets.  
  
 _No._  
  
Vanimórë caught Elgalad, and one Angband-forged sabre cut through the silver chain. Sauron saw a brief, fierce kiss, then Vanimórë nodded to his thigh-sheath. Elgalad drew out the dagger, standing alongside him.  
  
 _Fools, you cannot fight this with with steel._  
Sauron pushed through the force spewing from the statue, clutched his son's shoulder,  
“You are not ready!” he cried, and pushed past him. “ _Get out!_ ”  
He half-saw the startled sidelong look, felt the _Peredhil_ behind him, but could spare them no thought. The pressure clawed at his soul, sent spears of pain through his head as he trod across the rocking floor.  
  
“ _Get out!_ ” And: _No. You will_ not.  
  
There would be nothing left of him; his existence would be moored to Melkor's possession, always aware, always imprisoned. Melkor could not wholly enter Arda (Could he?) but he could crush Sauron's soul into a prison, and exist through him.  
  
Sauron raised his hands, called in all his power, threw it into the gap of nothing. Not daring to use the dark energy, he dragged it, remorseless, from his son, felt Vanimórë's instant flare of denial, as he drew on his own monumental reserves of will to strengthen himself. This usage was a kind of rape, and abhorrent to him. Through the storm came a sound like a great exhalation of greed and lust. Power lifted the roots of Sauron's hair; the air smelled of lightning. The pressure was titanic, a black wall that closed upon them, and there was no mercy there; it was as obsidian, gleaming and without human empathy.  
  
The _Peredhil_ leaped past him, raised their burning swords. Their hair streamed out in ebony torrents, living darkness against the unliving force, and their heads turned as they looked at one another, profiles of sculpted white stone. Then they brought the tips of their blades together.  
  
Falling stars flashed out of the blackness and struck the steel, ran down the blades and aureoled the twins in light. They blazed like uncovered suns. Sauron heard bright laughter, a shout of rage, a Song. And the air concussed.  
  


~~~

  
  
“Sire!” Voices cried out from the treetops, and the bell-towers pealed. The sounds echoed down through the air-shafts into the hall, and the King, Legolas and Bainalph sprinted from the chamber. In the great ward, men and women looked up. Clouds the colour of smoke streamed across the summer sky. A guard cried from a tall beech beyond the gates, and the king ran, climbed to the upper branches. The elevation of the land here gave the sentries an unimpeded view in all directions, save where the Emyn-nu-Fuin raised pine-clad shoulders to the south. The leaves parted for him as he stared south-west.  
  
A pillar of darkness whirled up from the distant forest, from the direction of Dol Guldur. Lit with lightning, with red fire, it rose and rose into the sky and beyond. Thranduil could see no end to it.  
  
“What is it?” Legolas' voice was hushed.  
  
Bainalph said: “Mother of Earth, _look!_ ”  
  
Thranduil needed no warning. An edge of force was racing north, the trees in its path, in full summer leaf, bending, cracking, some falling in an explosion of timber. The only time he had seen anything like this was the after-clap that followed Sauron's destruction on Orodruin.  
  
He stepped into the bell tower, hauling on the rope to change the warning; the cascade of notes that ordered all his people to strengthen the trees against the onslaught.  
  
“Father!”  
  
Thranduil waited until they were all down, and came to the ground with Legolas and Bainalph. The latter ran to different trees, pressed themselves close as lovers to the boles. The storm's approach was screaming thunder. Thranduil caressed the shivering beech-stem, and closed his eyes.  
  
 _Into the bark, the sapwood, the heartwood. Strengthen it. Hold it._  
  
And the storm struck.  
  


~~~


	5. ~ The Harrowing ~

  
**~ The Harrowing ~**

~ The presence rose against nothing, vast as the wave that sank Númenor, but this was not nature's wrath, blind and unthinking. This, Sauron knew.  
And Melkor knew him. Power plunged down to bury him, absorb him. He heard words amidst the avalanche: _So, thou couldst not resist the power? Thou hast made a grave mistake, and will answer for it._

 _No._  
He would be trapped here, tormented in ways beyond physical pain by the master he had once, long ago, loved, had come to loathe, and always, always feared. He called fire from his mind, memories of Orodruin, spun it like a cloak around him, and Melkor laughed. The contempt was eviscerating.

Some force caught Sauron, dragged him back. There was a flare of light that blinded and burned (he heard Melkor's hiss of pain) a boom, as of vast wings, and Sauron reeled, stumbled into the silence of the hall.  
His heart wild, spitting curses through his teeth, he leaned against the wall. A searing rage tore down the fringes of his soul. Then, as if a door had been slammed, it was gone.

He looked up. The hall was hollowed out, the roof gone. A faint miasma of dust tumbled in the air, but there was not even wreckage. The stone at the edges of destruction looked fused, melted. Grey clouds trailed like smokey banners across the uneasy sky. The air ached with the aftermath of power. He brought his eyes down, surveyed the unconscious figures, felt their life-force.

They had all been in the midst of that vortex; the power unleashed should have destroyed them as it had the hall; it had not because _they had not been here._

_We were in the Void._

And he had been dragged out, easily as a man picks up a drowning cat and lifts it to safety. By whom? There had been a sense of remembered might in the force, but it was not the Valar; they would be the first to banish him to the Void.

Vanimórë stirred, rose to his feet. His eyes were wild, but he did not speak. He looked down at Elgalad, unconscious, and stooped to lift him into his arms.

“Let him go,” he said. “Thou dost not need him.”

“You do not want to cross me now, my son, you truly do not.” The rush of power within Sauron was like strong wine. He had not felt thus in an Age, not since the One Ring was reft from him.

“Release him and I will not — ”

Sauron pushed himself from the wall. “Do you dare to bargain with me here, _now_? I can read you like a scroll. And I wrote that scroll. Your silver-haired beauty is a guarantee of your co-operation. And I think —” With a smile. “You will find that he will not leave you now, even if he could. You still think of him as the tender youth who clung to you. You will be surprised.”  
He snapped a command into the aether, felt the response of his guards. They came, though terrified. Even the Nazgûl had fled, their ancient hold on unlife almost snuffed, despite his bindings. He reached for them, caught them in the net of his displeasure, and sent them on another task.

“What did you see?” He turned his head back to his son. Vanimórë's eyes hammered into his like iron nails, wrathful and desperate.  
“Blackness,” he snapped out the words. “Melkor was there. And there were stars. Voices.” His voice cracked, revealing his shock as he asked, unwillingly: “What happened?”

“I dipped too deep into the power of the Void.” Sauron pitched his laughter soft. His son stared at him as if he had gone mad. “But here am I, nonetheless. How did you return, my son?”

“I felt something...” His brows crooked. “As if I were being held.”

_It was gentler with you, whatever it was. That is interesting._

Vanimórë looked down at Elgalad and his face shook. Then he mastered himself, as he had so many times before. “The _Peredhil_ : hast thou forgotten who they are? Thinks't thou their father, their grandam, Glorfindel will sit idly by knowing who has them? Or that they themselves will not resist thee? They already have. And Elgalad is a subject of the Elvenking. The wood-Elves will look for him.”

“I expected the _Peredhil_ to challenge me,” Sauron told him. “I needed to see their metal. I think you will agree they are impressive, even with the lingering poison in their bodies. As for their kin, let them rage. I hope they do more. I want to see how they answer this, if they even can.” He stepped across to Vanimórë, whose arms tightened about Elgalad. “I imagine the Elvenking _will_ try to rescue this one. I have sent the Nazgûl to er...warn them off.”

“Thinks't thou the _Peredhil_ will serve thee, even now?” Vanimórë's mouth lifted in a sneer. “They challenged _Melkor_.”

“Yes, they did.” And something had happened, those lights, that laughter had not been Melkor's corrosive mockery. “Melkor cannot touch them, though I wager he tried. And I have them. Fortunately for them, I am far more reasonable than he.” As the guards entered, he gestured. “Take that charming creature to your chambers, then attend me. He but sleeps, as do the twins. And he knows his purpose. I explained it to him. You will find him tractable.”

His son's eyes _blazed,_ promising retribution.  
“I swear to thee — ”

Sauron's temper frayed, snapped. He was, he thought, more shaken than he would admit to himself.  
“You have no game pieces to play with, so spare me your sapless oaths. Now _go._ ” His command thrummed in the walls, pregnant with power.

Without another word, Vanimòrë turned, strode from the room. Elgalad's silver hair poured to the floor, rippled like wings in the wind.

~~~

There was light, and then there was fire. He was the fire, and he was burned to ash, and still burned.

He held beauty in his hands, souls that made the stars draw aside in humility. And one by one, they fell. He raged. He wept. From a dark place, rank and foetid, came the feral grunts of orcs. His throat clogged with filth. The orc bared its ragged teeth, recognizing a kindred spirit.

Then came voice like an aubade, like the silver of battle trumpets: _ilar thanyë, ilar melmë, ilar malkazon sammë, osta ilar harwë, lau Ambar tana..._ *

His mouth shaped the words, broken jewels of fate.

A sound like thunder. The smell of black ice, bitter iron.

Nothing.

Panic rose like a covey of quail put to flight. There was nowhere to rest his eye, nothing to touch, an absence of everything save the sleet of his own thoughts.

_Elladan!_

Memories tolled a requiem.

_Those who break the Valar's Laws, who pursue unnatural acts are cast into the Everlasting Dark unless they repent..._

Glorfindel's voice, rich and mellow, drawn from a sheath of anger. Elrohir could see his beautiful face, those impossibly blue eyes.

 _Is this my punishment?_ he wondered.

He did not remember dying.

_Elladan?_

But surely his brother was not here. Elladan was honour and healing, the blue moonlight that fell like balm on his own crimson sickness. On that thought he felt it twine with his soul, and his hope crumbled to cold ash.

Then his nerves bayed a warning, and if he had possessed a body, he would have turned, Aicanáro rising to meet the threat. And, impossibly there was red fire and white: his blade and Elladan's. Elrohir could see, and wished he could not, because now he realized the immensity of this no-place. He knew what it was, (it was both legend and history) and who inhabited it.  
Might loomed over them, the pressure of a mountain falling, a landslide of despite, and —

Starfire exploded around him. Elrohir stood within light that would have slain a living body.

_Thou may not have them._

That voice, familiar, mellifluous but as fire is, that looks like silk and burns to ash, a voice that could command the sun to rise.

Wrath battered at the light, claps of noiseless, world-shaking thunder. The star flamed brighter, was joined by others, became a living wall of denial. The power raged beyond it, clawed at it, but could not penetrate it.

The star spoke to him.  
 _Thou doth not belong in the Everlasting Dark._

Another star spoke, and his words held an edge of blued steel: _Thou must both return, and quickly._

 _A doorway opened,_ said the first. _We will close it after thee._

He saw them then, as once they had been; they were incandescent, and he knew them in a way deeper than physical recognition. Their names were written in fierce blood. The visions seen in Aícanaro, the man standing in serpentine silver armour, in that bleak land at the end of the world, who had died in fire, as he had lived in fire, the King who looked like Elladan, whom had challenged and dueled with the the mightiest power to bestride Middle-earth. And died.  
They were here, in measureless Night. He had known it, not known what it truly meant. Who could?

 _They cannot destroy what we are. And neither can_ he.

He. The furious dark that howled like a gale of malice and titanic hatred — and desire.  
It _wanted_ them.

_Come._

Starfire held him in all its glory, all its pain, and pride and love.

 _Ah,_ it said. _Such a burning in thee. Such torment. I cannot heal it, nor would I. Thus we are tempered. But when the darkness is at its deepest, hold._

It was a farewell. Elrohir fought to hold on to the stars, to draw them out of Night, bring them back. Their glory, their ancient passion, deserved more than this empty fate, and the world was poorer without them. He tried to hold them, to absorb them —  
But they retreated, or he rushed away, until they became as watch-fires on a distant hill. He pressed the last glimmers deep into his soul.   
Then he was rushing toward his body, through the unconscious dark of sleep behind his eyes. He saw trees flick past like green-shrouded wraiths, and a spark of that green blinked at him like a startled cat. He caught at it, because it was alive, and clean and wild, held it as his eyes focused.

He was bound, hands and feet spread against rough wood. The long room was lit by two fires, by lamps. It was no orc den, but there was horror here. Shackles hung from the walls. Opposite him, Elladan was chained to a cross as, Elrohir realized, was he. He clenched his hands and the chains dug into the thin bones, sent spikes of pain through his nerves. He was naked. His eyes met his brother's; an unearthly light was held in Elladan's, dazzling and dazzled. Elrohir groped for a dissolving memory of darkness, starlight, spring-green eyes...

“Now that you are awake.”

Sauron walked like a wolf. He was a head taller than any Man or Elf Elrohir had ever seen, as it was said the Ainu were when they chose to clothe themselves in human raiment. But he was not human; there was something in his eyes wholly alien.

Blood-red rage welled in Elrohir, for the lies, the spread of evil that lapped at all the lands, for the monster who wore a fair face while his creatures raped and tortured, shadows of his shadow. He should have run Aicanáro through Sauron's heart. Why had he not, why had he and Elladan been impelled to do what they did? There had been light, and then...  
There was no time to remember. He must prepare. His eyes flicked aside, saw the implements of torture; A great hammer, nails half as long as a sword, things of an ugly, lingering death. His courage frayed, unrolled like old parchment. He had seen crucifixion before, orcs did it sometimes, if they passed through woods with prisoners, and so did Men. A fist of ice formed in his gut, spread outward, and gripped his heart. He lifted his gaze, looked at his brother.

_We cannot break._

Elladan's head moved in affirmation.

Sauron's eyes were colder than a mountain tarn. They stripped Elrohir of defences, understood all the emotions they uncovered, but they were not without empathy and that horrified Elrohir. Orcs enjoyed inflicting pain, Men could act like monsters, but Sauron was intelligent, discerning. He understood, and we think that understanding creates a common bond. Elrohir had lived long enough to learn that was not true, that there are some who can pick apart our hearts, empathize and care nothing, yet such realization leaves one unmoored, for what is a soul that can know, understand us, yet deem us insignificant? It leaves one without hope.

“After that little interruption,” Sauron said, in his modulated voice. “Let me return to our...discussion.”

Elrohir set his teeth.

A door at the end of the room opened, and Vanimórë entered, a wineskin over one shoulder. He looked severe, calm, white as salt. Sauron gestured and he poured the wine into silver cups, brought one to Elrohir, lifted it to his mouth. Elrohir set ice in his mute glare, and Vanimórë met it with eyes far more human than Sauron's. Despair and horror had made a nest within them.

“No?” Sauron said, as Elladan likewise refused the wine. He took the cup, sipped. “Then listen. You have come to me because I wished it, and you will serve me.”

“No.”

The lamps flickered.

“Your sword,” he said, and drew a knife from its sheath. “Once Anguirel. It lead you here. This was all for you, son of Elrond, although I am most happy to have both of you. It will...simplify matters. Crucifixion is only one way, if I decide you are of no use. This is another.”  
He traced the dagger's point across Elladan's flat belly. Elrohir's breath froze in his mouth. He dragged it into his lungs to shout, to struggle.

“In the south,” Sauron said. “They use eunuchs. Would emasculation help to ease the ache imposed by the Valar's prohibitions? I know all about that; rather an effective command when those frigid bastards have the power to effect their threat.”

Elladan turned his face away. His profile was stone. Elrohir saw a tear of sweat weep down his cheek. Between the lamps, the fire, the shadows were pitch.

“Perhaps castration would be a relief. Oh, I have the expertise to ensure that it will not kill.” The blade moved down to the black pelt at Elladan's groin. The point grazed just enough to leave a dark line on the flesh. Elrohir cried out, and Sauron whirled, paced across to him.  
The metal was ice on his skin. Sauron's eyes drank the light in the chamber, became wheels of fire. All was black beyond them, blackness like weight, like cliffs of basalt.

 _And what of you?_ The voice whispered behind him, at his side, all around, inside his head, and the fiery wheels spun. A circle of fire. No beginning, no end. _What of you, who watched his own mother raped, and would have taken her in the madness of battle-rut, mingling your seed with the orc's. Shall I take your manhood? At least you could be sure that you would never be tempted to rape._

The cave burst around him like pustulent flesh, spilling his own inner filth. He heard again the bestial grunting of the orc, saw the shapeless, filthy thing it drove into, felt the terrible ache of disgust and hunger in his loins.

_Do you not long to be punished?_

He gagged and groaned, felt Elladan's furious anguish, heard his screamed curse.

_I know what you fear, son of Elrond: that you are an orc under the skin, with their lusts._

Elrohir struggled; agony lanced his limbs.

_You thought to challenge me. Do you know how many Ages I have bent men like you to my will?_

Madness gibbered, vomited into Elrohir's mind. There had been stars, pride, passion. Where was it now?

He plunged down into the choking rot, the poison of his soul. He let himself go, and fell, and fell.  
And then...  
In the depths, where nothing could live, he felt warmth, an ember that would not go out; no, not an ember, a star. And there was something else, a surprised flash of green eyes in the dark, in a storm that broke the skies, a storm within him, red with lust.

The orc-cave collapsed, bled away. He was cast into light — sunlight on snow, a mountain slope, firs cobwebbed with white. Elrohir saw a battleground. He watched himself and his brother fighting orcs, one of the many times, but for the first time he saw how the rage in him burned outward to kill. Its violence was contemptuous of those he slew. They were nothing, existed only as meat for Aícanaro's lethal edge, fuel for his own self-loathing. Each orc was a contaminated chunk of his own uncleanliness.

And then the battle was gone, blotted by night.

 _Such beauty._ Sauron's voice was tender as a loving father's. _I gift you that, the memory of what you were. Now see what you could become._

This was a narrow place, some gut of stone lit by one meager, reeking torch. Two shapes crouched there, forgotten captives, the tattered remnants of clothes rotted on their skin. Their limbs were thin and white, ropey tendon, lank hair seethed with lice, fell in a greasy mat to pools of smeared filth and urine. As one shifted, he saw its groin, ancient scar tissue.

The creature lunged, snatched up a rat that scuttled against the wall. Tearing sounds came as it gnawed. The other leaped at it, fighting for the meal, and they snarled, grappling. One pulled on a fistful of hair, jerking back the thing's head, and Elrohir saw...

...saw his own face, teeth long and bloody, skin melted over bone, his eyes, unmistakably his eyes, red-rimmed, the whites soured to yellow, drained of sanity, and yet there was an awareness in them. It knew what — whom — it had been.

 _You can fall a long way before you die,_ the dark whispered. _Those who knew you will mourn you as dead. They will remember you as warriors, as Elrond's magnificent sons, sing songs of you, pray to the uncaring Valar for your rebirth beyond the Sea. They will never know what became of you, never know that you still live in the darkness like beasts. And then, one day, when the hunger becomes too great..._

Skin tore under yellow nails, frenzied jaws snapped and a ululating scream echoed against the walls. Then the feeding.

An explosion in Elrohir's his mind, fire like the birth of the sun.

_No!_

The room shook back into focus. Elrohir's throat was raw; he heard the echo of his cry, his brother's. Sauron moved away, let him see Elladan's face, his unmarred body. Elrohir could have wept. His heartbeat rampaged through his breast; perspiration slicked ice down his back. Elladan wrenched against the chains.

Sauron tossed the dagger idly, returned it to its sheath. He picked up one of the huge nails, turned it in elegant hands.  
“Do you think the orcs torture?” He smiled. “They can be inventive, but there is no greater vision in what they do. And their captives die in the end. There are fates more terrible than pain, are there not, than death? The mind is a wonderfully fertile bed of terror is it not?” He hefted the hammer. “There are so many ways to break a person, and yet every man or woman swears they will resist. They all break.”

“Do what you will,” Elladan said, and Elrohir heard the strain, the terror that he beat down. “In the end, _Gorthaur_ , you will not conquer.” He glowed, beautiful in his defiance, and Elrohir knew that he would do anything to save his brother from the demolition he had seen, from pain. The thought of Elladan reduced to that _thing,_ was an abomination against nature. It hurt, ah, it hurt more deeply than his mother's rape.

Elladan said, his eyes brilliant, unblinking: “Do it. Any of it; all. _Do it._ ”

There are moments that shatter the soul, break it, and if it heals, it is enlarged. It must be stretched by anguish to hold anguish, empathy, unselfish love. Elrohir felt his heart break. His throat swelled shut.

Sauron's brows rose quizzically. “Very well,” and stepped to Elladan. The nail glinted dully. It was so dark now, and Elladan's body was pale as frost against the wooden cross as if lit from within. The walls about them swept up into iron shadows. Abhorrence yawned a throat of insanity in Elrohir's mind. His blood beat like thunder in his veins, and he cried: “Stop!”

The walls caught the sound, sent it crashing back and forth. Elrohir was sweating like a blood horse after battle. Sauron's eyes turned to him.

“No,” he said, and to his brother: “I cannot.”

“What do you offer me?” Came Sauron's voice from all around. Elrohir thought, with a sense of disorientation, that they were not in Dol Guldur at all, but some darker place, titanic, founded on power and blood.

“What do you want?”

“Elrohir, _no!_ ”

He lifted his chin. “I will not,” he enunciated carefully. through a throat scorched with unshed tears. “Allow you to suffer.”

There was so much love in Elladan's silent communication. Elrohir did not deserve it, though as always, he accepted it into his avid, unassuagable need.  
He himself had earned a horrific fate, castration, crucifixion, that stripping of humanity, the long descent into madness and degradation, but he recoiled from it. There are some places the spirit cannot go. He had thought nothing could be worse than the orc-cave. Sauron's imagination could produce greater horrors than Elrohir could imagine.

“I want your allegiance.” Sauron pointed to Vanimórë. Elrohir had forgotten he was there. “For you to serve me as he does. It is not so terrible as you imagine.”

Vanimórë met Elrohir's eyes. He knew what they had been shown. Was this what bound him?

 _Elrohir, Elrohir._ His brother shook his head, then said to Sauron, eyes valiant, unafraid: “You cannot gain our allegiance through fear. You will possess slaves, nothing more. And you know we will try to escape.”

Sauron's mouth formed a moue of indifference.  
“You see, I have no moral objection to slavery. As for fear, you have see that I have no objection to using that as a weapon.”

The door opened.  
Elrohir smelled them before he saw them, the foxy musk of black Uruk's, huge creatures with brutal faces almost human, wolfish incisors. They bowed before Sauron. Elrohir heard a growl begin low in his throat, and the orcs bared their teeth. Sauron snapped a string of words in Black Speech. They turned to Vanimórë, and something in their demeanor visibly changed. They were afraid of him.

“You think you can fight me. I have seen so much resistance. You think to escape. Do you not think _he_ would have, were it so easy.”

There was a shirr of air as Vanimórë drew his swords. Sauron hissed like a cat. Vanimórë staggered, his sinews straining against some force that drove him in hard, battling increments to his knees. His face glossed with the sweat of striving, and his hands were prised from his sword-hilts. The orcs tossed the blades away, and were on him. Still he fought, against them, against Sauron's sorcery, and said no word. He was dragged upright, turned and thrown against the wall, his wrists manacled. As the thick braid of his hair swung aside, a brand blazed at the base of his spine. The Red Eye; it seemed alive, burning. Vanimórë wound his hands about the chains, and stilled. Elrohir knew what he was doing; bracing himself, determined to endure with some dignity. But how could he, how could any-one?

Sauron sat, crossed one leg over the other, and dropped his chin on one hand.  
“He tried to help you escape, as I knew he would. He knows the punishment.”

Elrohir thought his heart would crack as he, too, fought his bonds. Sauron's eyes flicked to him and he said one word. It coiled like a snake, and hot acid scored Elrohir's nerves. He went blind with agony. When sight returned he was gasping.

“You felt contempt for him. That is amusing.”

The orcs were hugely engorged, and when the first one drove in, Vanimórë's lean body arched in pain, his muscles knotted, head flung back. Far off, Elrohir heard voices shouting, cursing. It was a vision of horror that sickened in his gut, and there was no escape from it. The orcs plunged into their captive, grunting, that sound of lust that rode Elrohir's mind, asleep and awake, and when the creature came to release, backed away, another took his place. Elrohir wanted to look away, and could not. Vanimórë did not cry out, his face was ghostly in its pallor, unbearably beautiful, and to see him raped was to see all the wrongness of the world made real. The air stank of orc-seed. Another took the place of the third, and the world collapsed upon itself in madness, as if it could look no more.

When it was over, Elrohir felt tears on his cheeks, saw them on his brother's.

The orcs trooped out, silent. They cast fearful looks back at their victim as they left. Elrohir wondered if they expected retribution, and hoped it was so.  
Sauron rose, walked to Vanimórë who shuddered as his manacles were unlocked, and braced himself against the wall. He breathed deeply, then turned. In some way, through the rape, his beauty had brightened, and his face would haunt Elrohir forever. It held the look of one betrayed so many times that he no longer expected anything else, but still, like a child, hopes. Red-tinged seed stained his inner thighs, but he held himself straight as a lance, unconquered. His magnificent eyes hardened as Elrohir watched, against shame, against his rape. Sauron laid a hand on his cheek in an unsettling gesture of tenderness.

“Go and bathe,” he said. “Then you may kill them. Attend me after. I need to see your pretty friend.”

Vanimórë gathered his clothes, his weapons, and walked, proud and careful to the door. The sound of its closing behind him was like the end of an argument.

“You think,” Sauron said to them. “To resist, to deceive, to escape. But you will serve me. I could geld and crucify you, and send you out as a warning. I could geld you, and keep you. The orcs will use you for sex, and then I will shut you in Barad-dûr, in a place so deep the very echoes of your suffering will be buried, and there you shall break, slowly, never dying, and always knowing what you are, what you were. You think I cannot do this? I have done it to others. And when the time comes for my legions to sweep west, I will take Imladris and Lothlórien, and I will show you all that comes to pass.”  
He picked up his wine and drank. “You will serve me. Skilled officers enjoy a very different life to the one you imagine. And I would prefer not to destroy the Elves, but that rather depends on them. And on you.”

Elrohir wanted to vomit. His body was sleek with cold, bitter sweat, his bones shook.  
“You said you wanted me.”

Sauron inclined his head.  
“Yes. There is a darkness in you. I like it.”

“I will serve you.” The word tasted of rot. “Let my brother go.”

“Elrohir, no.”

“I will swear any oath, but let him go.”

“You are mad. I will not let you bargain with me — ”

“Be _quiet._ ” His voice was racked. He could not look at Elladan's face. Sauron appeared amused. The fire spun in his eyes.

“We are linked,” Elrohir said. “And I would know if he were harmed, even were he a thousand leagues away. We always know. Because there is a way of escape, Sauron. If we are together, we can choose to die by our own hands, and I swear we will do it. But if you release him, if Elladan goes free, unhurt, I will know he lives, and I will serve you, and he will know that I live. If one of us dies, so will the other, sooner or later, and you will have nothing.”

His words echoed. The wheels of flame had become one in a vault of night.

And then Sauron laughed, moved toward him, through fire.

“Very good,” he said, his voice soft under Elladan's furious, pain-filled protest. “I think you will make an excellent servant. You _desire punishment._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Part of the Oath of Fëanor (Quenya).


	6. ~ The Biter-Bit ~

~ Vanimórë scrubbed at his skin. To think was to open the door to the endless screams that lived in the pulse of his blood, thus he had learned not to think, to force each and every abuse deep within himself, bury it under a cairn of will. He dressed, riding the protests of his misused flesh. It would heal. As for the orcs, they could wait on his pleasure. Had he not been restrained, he would have killed them, but they, knowing his vengeance, would never have touched him had they not been whipped by their master's will. Nevertheless.

 _It is done,_ Sauron told him, and showed him Elrohir's bargain. With a curse, Vanimórë flung the blooded wash-cloth into the bowl, dried himself.  
 _He will hold to his word, believing his slavery merited._

Vanimórë dressed, left his room, walked the burn of pain and ignored it. Along the passage a thudding sound emanated from a locked door. As he lifted the heavy bar, the sound ceased, and he opened it to reveal Elgalad, positioned to attack. The tunic had been discarded; he was dressed now, but in black, matching Vanimórë's own somber gear, and against it the flood of unbound hair looked almost white. His face opened like a flower to the sun as Vanimòrë appeared. It was painful to see, gouged gut-deep rents of shame. It was the look one bestowed upon a hero, not a slave who found himself in a blind alley.

There was no time to hold him off. Elgalad's threw himself into Vanimórë's arms, his own locked tight, and he kissed like a storm. Vanimórë could not fight, did not want to. There was more healing in the kiss than he had imagined. He staggered under it, and Elgalad drew away, hands tracing his face. The grey eyes fast on his were fathomless. He could fall into them forever, and, long ago, he had. They had never released him.

He whispered. “I th-thought he was thee.”

The light, warm voice, the stumble over words brought back the young Elgalad. He still retained the antique tongue he had learned from Vanimórë, who, in his turn had learned it from a Noldo prisoner in Angband. The _peredhil_ had not spoken thus. Perhaps it had been left behind, a relict of the bitter Elder Days.

“Vanimórë,” Elgalad said without a hitch, and the sound of his name on the beautiful mouth was as rain on blighted earth. Then, as he sought for words, wariness stilled the lovely face. “H-he became _thee_. He changed before m-me.”

 _Thou cruel bastard!_ Vanimórë flung at his father.

“I am not he.”

Elgalad's hands hovered close to his face. He caught them.  
“I know.” His breath hitched.

“I cannot free thee.” While he did not trust Sauron, sometimes he kept his word. When it suited him. Elgalad was the assurance of Vanimórë's co-operation in the matter of the _Peredhil_. Elrohir may have offered himself, but that meant nothing to Vanimórë; he would aid him in escaping if he could. But not at the cost of Elgalad's life.

 _I cannot,_ he thought, caught in a net of horror. _What can I do?_

“I know that t-too.” Soft lips patterned his face.

Vanimórë set his hands on Elgalad's breast. “Wait. I cannot think when thou art touching me.” His words belied his actions as he drew Elgalad against him, rested his cheek against the silver hair. “He wants thee so I will not aid the _peredhil_.”

“Elrond Eärendilion's sons.” Elgalad raised his head, and he did not have to raise it far, now. “The Sons of Thunder. H-he told me.”

“What did he do to thee?” Harm did not always show external marks. But he saw nothing in those rain-coloured eyes that he did not expect to see. There was shock, fear, nothing more deadly.

Elgalad tensed against a shiver. “He did n-not touch me. He said...I w-was more useful alive. But h-he felt like...his power, it was like fire on m-me, inside me, stripping m-my thoughts.”

He knew. “My dear.”

“He sent the N-Nazgûl north. I heard in my m-mind. To ensure I am n-not followed.”

The wood-Elves. “They will follow thee?”

“Yes. When I first woke h-here, I could not feel them, but after...” He stopped, looked around as if seeking words, then said, “the Hall, I could reach their m-minds. I told them not to c-come. But they w-will. They will. I w-would.”

Vanimórë disengaged himself, went to the shrouded window, and drew back the shutters. Warm sunlight fell through the glass, cut by narrow iron bars. Elgalad came to his side, reached for the bars and lifted himself effortlessly to look out.

“There is d-damage,” he said. “It looks as if a storm swept th-the forest.”

“Let me see.” Taking Elgalad's place, he saw for himself. His field of vision was limited, but he could see cracked and uprooted trees, and no trace of Dol Guldur's poisonous smoke. Elgalad's eyes were distant, a frown on his brow. “It will h-heal,” he said. “It would not have b-been as destructive within the kingdom.”

That, Vanimórë did not understand, but he understood very little of what had happened in the Great Hall, which had looked as if pierced by a gigantic white-hot awl, the edges of the stone cauterized. The shock-wave had battered the forest, dispersed the smoke.

_We should be dead._

He lowered himself.

 _We cannot have been in the Void, not physically._ As far as he understood it, the Void was the opposite of matter. A body could not live there, not travel there. Sauron said Melkor had, but as spirit.

_So what in the Hells happened?_

He shook his head once, throwing the bootless conjecture aside.

“Thou canst touch the minds of all the wood-Elves?” he asked. The light caressed Elgalad's face.

“Some of them.” To Vanimórë's surprise, he flushed. “It w-was _Nost-na-Lothion._ It was still in m-my blood when I heard th-thee, or I thought it was thee.”

When a prisoner of war, Vanimórë had glimpsed the Elven celebration of the Winter Solstice. In Mordor, under the red glower of Barad-dûr they had defied war, slaughter and darkness. He guessed that all such celebrations were as feral, that the wood-Elves ignored the Laws that constrained the Noldor, but they were not a people he knew well.

 _You still think of him as the tender youth who clung to you,_ his father had said of Elgalad. _You will be surprised._

Perhaps he was surprised, but had he not wanted Elgalad to find a new life, to forget him? The face turned up to his was as innocently beautiful as the child who had been, for a time, his deepest joy.  
 _He still is._  
But he had long left childhood behind. Under the black breeches, Elgalad was aroused. So was Vanimórë, and as unable to hide it.  
All he said was, “I would never call thee, my dear. Thou knowest I feared this.” Desperation flashed through him. He set his teeth, fighting it, because if he allowed it to possess him and grow he would be useless.

Elgalad flinched, but said, “And yet, I n-never stopped hoping that thou w-wouldst be free one day, to come for m-me.”

Vanimórë's heart bled a shard of pain. He wrapped his arms around Elgalad, closed his eyes. Dol Guldur faded to nothing, as his heartbeats measured love, and found it immeasurable. He drank it like nectar and, on the borders of his mind, Sauron teased him. It was needless. He mocked himself. Elgalad's parents had died; all the care, the deep bond that was said to exist between the souls of mother, father, child, had been severed. Elgalad had only him. Of course he would love the one who tried to fill their roles. Whom else was there?

What could he do now, for Elgalad, for the sons of Elrond? _Think._

All three served a purpose. In Elrohir he saw reflections of himself, self-hate, rage running like hot, black poison under his skin, in his eyes. Sauron had pulled an image from the _peredhel's_ mind, shaken it out for Vanimórë to see: a quayside, grey sea, rain on the wind, a ship with white sails, and a woman hurrying up the ramp while her sons looked on, desolate. When a woman or man suffered raped, part of them snapped, coiled inward, and did not always unfurl to grow again. Thus is had been with Elrond's wife. She had left Middle-earth, and because Elrohir had never received her forgiveness for his perceived sin, he had festered. But battle-lust was common. Some did indeed act on it, but Elrohir had not, and Vanimórë doubted he would have. Surely Glorfindel, whom had seen so much in two lives, could have advised him? He remembered, with a backward look of pleasure, the golden fury that had strode into his prison-tent in Mordor, hit him backhanded so hard that darkness had eclipsed his sight, the sex that followed, soaked with violence that Vanimórë welcomed and provoked. * Violence and lust were bedfellows, but in Elrohir's mind they had twisted, become monsters that he hid from all but himself. Glorfindel could have helped him.  
 _But he would not have, of course. The Laws that shackle the Noldor. He even warned me. I laughed, but he would not risk condemning Elrohir._  
And Elrohir had become what he was. Tempered, controlled, he would be a near-perfect weapon for Sauron.

_Is he replacing me?_

Vanimórë turned the question in his mind, dispassionate. No-one was irreplaceable, but it would take Sauron a long time to mould Elrohir as he had Vanimórë. There were no blood-ties to bind, only fear: Elrohir's fear for his twin, the fact that he could not face the future Sauron had shown him.

_Neither could I._

What would Elladan do? Refuse to leave his twin, but if forced to — and he would be — he would go, return with an army, and Sauron would test his enemies.  
As for Elgalad, he was the biter-bit for Vanimórë. Sauron knew that if he hurt Elgalad, his son would — _What will I do?_ He sneered at himself. There was only one thing he could do, and he would have to make sure he took Elgalad with him, because in the Void he could do nothing at all, not even plead.

That was the only leverage he had, the one way of escape for both of them, for all of them. But he had seen the Void now, knew what waited there for him, an age-long promise of eternal torment. It, _he, Melkor_ had recognized Vanimórë, moved toward him like an avalanche of horror. Thinking of it, ice threaded his spine.

 _And what do you think awaits Elgalad?_ Sauron questioned. _He has known pleasures with other Men. Does he not break the Laws of the Valar?_

 _He does not know the Laws!_ But he had considered that; it stayed his hand.

 _Will that make a difference?_ His father's mind-voice gentled. _I knew my kin before time. You yourself rejected their dubious mercy. My dear, you are truly shackled._

“Thou art shaking,” Elgalad said, mouth against his skin.

“I cannot keep thee safe.” He caught Elgalad's shoulders, feeling the taut muscle. This was a warrior, not a child. _But so am I, and I am helpless._

 _Do not be a fool,_ his father chided cool, without a flicker of humour. _Simply follow my orders and he will live untouched, unharmed. You are of no use to me insane, or dead. Neither, for that matter, is he._

“My beloved l-lord, _I know._ ”

“Thou canst not understand.”

“I do,” Elgalad refuted. “I have seen h-him. His power has soaked through th-this place. Even the Houseless do not c-come here.” He traced the air with slim fingers. “I felt them, but he held my m-mind. I think they tried to warn me, b-but even the others, those who hunger for a b-body, even they avoid the center of power. Th-there is naught here but _him,_ and h-he is so strong.” A shiver racked him like a whip. “His power spreads out l-like heat from a fire, into th-the forest. The woods themselves w-warped, trying to twist away from it, so it was said, and I b-believe it now. And nevertheless, my people will follow me h-here.”

“And he has the perfect response to them,” Vanimórë said. “Thou.”

Elgalad's head dipped. “I know.”

“They will die for naught! Reach them now, and tell them that.”

“I already h-have. And they know of th-the sons of Elrond.” The clear eyes rose again. “They will not serve h-him.” His voice came urgently. “We do not visit Imladris, b-but we get news from the birds. The orcs of the m-mountains flee from their faces. They w-would no more serve h-him than I...”

“Yes,” Vanimórë agreed tightly. “And for the same reason. It is Elrohir who will serve, the one whose fire burns dark, who carries Anguirel reforged, that the Witchking once bore, and Sauron re-made aforetime in Angband. His twin will be spared, taken to the borders. That is the bargain Elrohir has made. When his father learns what has happened, they will return, no doubt, with whatever army they can now muster.”

Elgalad stared at him. “One cannot t-take this place with an army. The King h-has tried. ”

“There are ways to approach; Sauron would have made thee wear a mask, given thee protection, coming here.”

“I cannot remember.” He frowned. “Wait — yes, there was th-the scent of strange herbs, a tang on my lips wh-when I woke, like m-metal and sickness.”  
That awakening was in his eyes, and Vanimórë kissed his brow, wishing he could take the memory away.

“It is narcotics mostly, forge smoke, and a touch of his sorcery, strong enough to affect the minds of Elves and Men. There are ways to combat it, paths to use, and one acquires a certain resistance to it after a time. Whatever happened in the hall has dispersed it, but not for long.”

“I h-heard what he said to th-thee.”

“What he said?”

“ That thou wert n-not ready. ”

“That.” He thought about it. “Melkor. He does not want his old master back any more than I do. Believe me, if Sauron is a surgeon's blade, Melkor is a mace, uncaring of what it strikes.”  
 _He wants me to stand against Melkor, if he ever returns? I thank thee, father. I doubt I will ever be ready for that._  
And, of course, he would fight.  
 _So is my ending written._

He paced to a small table where a jug of wine stood, poured and tasted it. There was nothing in it but Dorwinion grapes, and he held out the cup to Elgalad. “Listen to me.” He wanted to tear at his hair, to howl his frustration against the impassive walls. “If thou seest a chance of escape, take it. I cannot aid thee. Sauron walks my mind as a man walks a house long lived-in.”

“I cannot, m-my Lord — ”

“Thou shalt. I can see thou hast known battle, and are not the child I knew. If there is an opportunity — ”

“I _c-cannot._ ” Elgalad took a step forward, eyes intent on his. “His persuasions d-do not run only one w-way.”

It stopped him for a moment. Then his voice came rough: “This is my life. I know the risks I take in disobeying him, and thou canst not trust him to keep his word. And,” as Elgalad shook his head. “if it is a choice between aiding thy people and me? He will make thee choose again and again. It will destroy thee.”

The silver head dropped. Vanimórë saw the inward tug of his brows. When his head came up, his mouth was set in a firm line.

“I will d-do,” he said equivocally. “What I c-can.”

Silence drifted between them. Vanimórë could not look away from him. He had thought of Elgalad as a distant jewel, known he was alive because such a bond as theirs could not be broken by time or the sundering leagues of Middle-earth. He saw the changes, a hint of wildness, not recklessness but something ancient, untamed. That, he could not read, did not know what might spring from it, but there were other strands he could follow, rooted in that alien place: the webwork of love that bound Elgalad to the Wood. Some threads were delicate, almost playful, others ran strong as spun steel. People Elgalad loved, who loved him.  
He was too terrified to feel jealousy, though that feeling hovered at his shoulder, cynically smiling. Selfish, starving, his soul rejoiced in Elgalad's presence. When had he become so self-obsessed?

_I always was. When one has nothing, one clings to anything._

He pushed his fingers into his hair.

“He needs me, at least for now. Whatever he says or does, he will never leave me useless to him. Remember that.”

“My Lord — ”

“And do not call me thus.” He dropped his hands. “It is untrue, and he would find it amusing.”

“What else w-was I to call thee? Thou didst n-not give me thy n-name. Why not, Vanimórë?” Elgalad stepped closer.

“He named me. That too, was mockery.”

“N-no.” He slid his arms around Vanimórë's waist. “I learned Quenya at thy kn-knee. Beautiful Darkness. N-names are truth.” Then he stiffened, breath going in deep. “Orc seed.” The words hissed like a profanity. “I thought — b-but their reek is everywhere. What d-did — ?”

“Do not,” Vanimórë warned. The _peredhil_ had wept when he was raped, and he thanked Eru, or his father's judgement of character that Elgalad had not been made to witness it. His sinews flinched in memory, and the grey eyes changed, water struck by lightning. It was a look Vanimórë had never seen before, but he knew that many an orc had, before they died. He had seen it in the eyes of the Elves who fought on Dagorlad, in Mordor, in that last slaughter on the slopes of Orodruin. It had been in the _Peredhil's_ eyes. To see it in Elgalad's took his breath.

“I heal fast.”

White teeth bared, and Elgalad whirled away toward the door that Vanimórë had not locked behind him, hands reaching for weapons that were not there.

“Thou canst not fight him,” Vanimórë rapped.

Elgalad swung back. Vanimórë saw thoughts fall like leaves through his mind.

“Thou d-didst save him.” His tone was not condemnatory, rather, curious. “I saw thee throw h-him away from that...darkness.”

That had been pure instinct, or so he hoped.  
“Yes. He was the only one with the power to fight it. I am not even certain what would have happened, but if Melkor had found a way through...” _Bloody Hells, that was too close!_ “if he had won, had the Valar not defeated him, he would have devoured the world, Elgalad. His hate was that profound, that... _insane._ Sauron does not want utter annihilation.”

“O-only to enslave us,” Elgalad said. “Choosing b-between a greater evil or a lesser, is n-no choice at all.”

And sometimes, Vanimórë wanted to say, one does not have a choice. But that was a lie. He had chosen a life of servitude over the Void, and now he was forced to confront his cowardice. There were others in the Everlasting Dark who should not be there. No Elf or Man should be condemned to that no-place. Yet they endured; more, they fought back.  
“I would accept my fate and take thee with me rather than see thee in his power.” His nails dug into his palms. “But thou knowest what happens to the souls of Elves slain in his shadow.”

The Houseless had threatened him only once, in the early years of Sauron's occupation of the fortress. He had thrust them away easily enough, guessed that they had sensed what he was, and had no desire to inhabit a body enslaved to the very power that bound them. Since then, none had come near him.

Elgalad said, “I know.” The sunlight faded. He was a candle in the room. “Thy fate? Take m-me with thee?”

“And he is right, even wert thou free, thou hast transgressed against the Laws of the Valar.”

“Laws?” Elgalad's frown deepened. “Th-that old tale? We are the children of th-the Earth. The Belain are n-naught to us. What fate?” He moved from the door. “The _Void_?” He stared.

“The Valar may be naught to thee, but there are those among them given the power to determine the fate of souls after death.” He ignored the question. His throat clenched, dry as ash. He scraped up words. “If thou wert to die —

“We become H-Houseless,” Elgalad took three swift steps toward him, eyes brilliant, fixed on his. “This is our h-home, not the W-West. My Lord, the Void is n-not thy fate!”

_Both Melkor and Sauron have claimed me, written their names on my soul. Even were the Valar inclined to break that binding, still I am bound to Darkness._

He was aware of Sauron's attention, that it was light, amused. He did not believe Vanimórë would kill himself, go of his own volition into Night with Melkor waiting. That was a pity.

_No, I doubt thou doth need worry, father. I think I have made myself too damned good at staying alive._

“Live this,” he gestured, encompassing the chamber, Dol Guldur, Elgalad's prison. “however thou canst, as if it were a battle, which it is. In life there is hope of freedom. There may be none in death. I _know._ I was offered freedom in Valinor if I would live in _righteousness_. This, after Gil-galad was damned to the Void for loving another man.” ** Rage blossomed. That pronunciation of doom was unconscionable. “I rejected the offer. I _chose_ this life. I could have ended it long ago.”

Emotions broke into Elgalad's eyes. He caught Vanimórë's tunic in both hands, pushed him against the wall.

“Thou w-wouldst tell me th-thou art craven?” He cursed in some silk-weave tongue than Vanimórë did not know, but was not Sindarin, and so must be the Silvan Elves native language. “They left thee n-nowhere to go, and th-thou wouldst think thyself a _c-coward?_ I have seen th-thee fight to save me!”

“I fought creatures I knew I could outmatch.” Vanimórë swallowed a knot of self-derision.

“N-Not then.” Elgalad's grip tightened. “The last time I saw th-thee. _He_ would h-have had thee rape m-me. Thou didst fight h-him. I _saw_ thee on th-thy knees, in agony. And I r-ran. _I_ w-was the craven. I knew thou wouldst n-never have harmed me.” ***

The room darkened. A boom of wind slammed and broke against the walls, rain struck the glass like pebbles.

_That power affected the weather. I am not surprised._

“Elgalad,” he began.

The silver hair hissed like silk as Elgalad shook his head.  
“No. I know what th-thou art doing. Thinks't thou I h-have not seen it before, warriors wh-who believe themselves cowards in b-battle, who survive and feel guilt, and w-would push every-one away, thinking th-they are undeserving of love, of friendship. N-No, my love. Thou hast fought h-him all thy life.” His eyes shone with tears; one of them fell, and Vanimórë reached to catch it on his finger. “They left thee n-nothing,” Elgalad whispered. “Thou art standing th-there in pain, come from a _r-rape_ and will not acknowledge it. Thou w-wouldst tell m-me thou art craven to drive m-me from thee again. It will n-not work.”

Vanimórë could not speak. There was one way, one sure way that would demolish Elgalad's trust, his love. He took a breath to say it, to see the horror and disbelief break into those shining eyes.  
And he could not do it. The words turned to dust in his throat, melted away. Elgalad released his tunic, embraced him, and Vanimórë held him, feeling the beat of his heart, the warmth of his breath as he spoke:  
“Thou d-didst speak of accepting thy fate as if it had n-not occurred to thee before.”

“I vowed not to break.” So long ago, and such a child he had been, his sister's death on his soul. “I thought to kill myself would be to surrender, to stop fighting them. Melkor waits for me. I thought in the Void I would have no control, that he would torment my soul, and destroy even that. But those that were banished there, thou didst feel them? They were _fighting._ Perhaps I could.”

There was pure horror in Elgalad's eyes as he shifted back.  
“ _N-No._ ” The word was a groan. “I felt th-them, yes, the power of th-their souls. But thou art fighting, too. Th-Thou art in the crucible, _and always h-have been._ ” Then his face shook. “How c-can I ask thee to l-live? But thou art m-my life! I was born for th-thee.”

The avowal of his youth was a white light in his eyes.

_And, Eru curse me, I am glad of it._

“It is not always like this,” he said, an attempt to calm. “I am useful. I am his emissary to other lands, people, nations. I am a warrior.”

“And so, b-because thou art not _always_ r-raped it is acceptable?” Elgalad's voice broke. His hands came up, formed wings about Vanimórë's face. “I do n-not know how h-he dares.”  
He pressed close again, as if it absorb all hurt, to blot up grief itself. The wonder of it was that he did.

_And I could drink all he offers, take all that love into myself, and want more._

He clung to a ledge over a void of despair.

_Elgalad, I have to free thee, before thou doth cripple me utterly, bind me more tightly than my father. I will be able to do naught, fearing to bring hurt on thee. And, too, I must free Elrohir before his darkness eats him. And I cannot._

Shadow poured into the room as angry winds pushed cloud across the sky. Then lightning flared. Thunder rode hard on its heels.

_Light in the darkness.  
Lights in the Void._

His breath lay in his mouth as he thought back to what he had witnessed, felt in the Dark. It was important for some reason he could not yet identify, but he had learned to trust his instincts. He was uncertain of what he had seen, and what was his own imagination, but there was...whiteness, arms encircling him as Elgalad's did now. He had thought only his father could fight Melkor, but it had not been Sauron who pulled him from the Void.

I _cannot free Elgalad or Elrohir, though I will attempt it and fail, but there are others who might essay it._

Unused to asking for aid, for seeking it outside himself, he had not considered it.

His thoughts whirled, settled on Imladris, on Glorfindel, who must have felt that shattering of the aether. He walked in two worlds; had died and returned. He was the only one Vanimórë had any hope of reaching. They had been intimate, had ended respecting one another. Glorfindel _must_ know what Sauron had done, what he desired: To test the last Noldor in Middle-earth. Did Imladris even know it was Sauron who sat in Dol Guldur? They must. The _peredhel_ had not been surprised.

Sauron would snuff his sending easily as a candle, would expect his thoughts to run this way, knowing he could do nothing. And so —

He slid his hands down water-soft hair, and Elgalad looked up, lips parting. With infinite care Vanimórë eased into the mind behind his eyes, and for heartbeats was made senseless by its beauty. In the kiss, he tasted rain that seeped down into rills of water, slid over moss, beside damp green ferns. Leaves caressed his face, fragmented the sun, supple wood pulsed under his feet. He lay on warm grass scattered with fragile flowers, and the sky arched above him, a vault of blue and white. He became aware of exhaustion deep in his bones, wanted to lie down and sleep forever. He struggled against the deadly enchantment of promised peace.

_No peace, no freedom._

A sweet, strong wind caught him, lifted him above fatigue. Bright water cascaded through his veins. He touched a power so alien that he had to pause and consider it, and then knew it for Elgalad himself, for the wood-Elves, bound to the forest, to all its moods and seasons. He saw their savage denial of the shadow that licked up from the south, from this place, saw a man's face, beautiful and proud, gold hair, steel-bright eyes: Thranduil. The eyes seemed to fix upon his for a moment, until he plunged down into rich loam fed by Ages of leaf-fall, crumbled bones, dying plants, where seeds burgeoned and grew again, a timeless cycle of birth and death, sweet and bitter as life itself.

Here he could elude his father's awareness. With Elgalad as the conduit, he could reach —

He opened his eyes, looked into ones blue as cobalt, that could blaze with white fire, and hurled into Glorfindel's mind all that he needed to know.

The door opened, catching a draft from somewhere in the fortress, and pressure descended like a vast hand sheathed in power like steel. Vanimórë severed the connection brutally, ended the kiss. Elgalad whirled as Sauron, composed as a cat, entered the room. Behind him was Elrohir, now clad in black gear, Aícanaro rode at his shoulder. His face was white as quartz, but his eyes were flame. There was rage in them, pain in the stern lines of his mouth. He locked gazes with Vanimórë, and there was disgust in his expression, madness strained close to breaking. Too close. If he lost control, no-one could help him. Vanimórë's mind slapped him, brusque, cool, and Elrohir started, as if he had received a bucket of icy water in the face. His black brows crooked inward, then smoothed, long black lashes lowered, but the light in his eyes seemed to cast opalescent glints on the high cheekbones.

_This one is dangerous, to himself, to others._

Elgalad made a strange, keening sound in his throat, and Vanimórë snapped out a hand, pulled him back. Sauron's mouth curled.

“Give this one armour.” He indicated Elrohir. “You are of the same height and build. Some of his training will be in your hands.”

“What is he?” Elrohir asked on a snarl. “Your captain? And what of my brother?” He looked up to meet Sauron's eyes, and his own were as glass with stars behind them. Vanimórë saw what it cost him to hold that regard, how he refused to flinch under it.

_There is not just darkness in him, but he walks on the very edge, and his defiance is dangerous. He taunts knowing he may be punished, and dreading it. Yet still he pushes._

Sauron allowed moments to pass; the lantern flickered, and the wolf-wind clawed at the walls. Vanimórë felt Elgalad's pulse, heard, under the storm, the moan of hatred in his rapid breaths. Then Sauron laughed, took Elrohir's jaw in one hand.  
“Fortunate you are that I consider you worth the time and trouble to train.” He turned the _peredhel's_ beautiful face toward Vanimórë, said nothing, only allowed him to remember what he had witnessed. Vanimórë slammed a warning into the violent eyes.

“Vanimórë is many things,” Sauron said. “He is not my captain. He is commander-in-chief of all my forces.”

Elrohir's expression changed, and still Vanimórë could not read it.

 _But were I him, I would seek to learn everything, so that it might be of use one day. Is that not a risk?_ he asked his father.

 _A warning,_ was the reply. _You know our forces. Neither failing Gondor nor the Elves can match them in these times. They cannot take the Gate. It does not matter what they know, even if these twins share some deep bond I cannot touch, and can communicate when apart, fear is a useful instrument of war._

It was, but Vanimórë did not think fear would debilitate Sauron's enemies. They could not allow it to; one day they must fight him or bow to him.

“Prepare an escort to take the twin to the borders at dawn tomorrow,” his father said aloud. _The mists are dispersed, and this weather is disturbed; to release any more would be a waste; it would thin too fast, and lose its potency. We use this opportunity to get the brother to the border by the quickest route._

Vanimórë had become accustomed to the stillness of Dol Guldur. Sauron could shape the weather though, since his return, his power was lessened, and the area of calm around the fortress extended no more than a few leagues. But that was enough for the smokes to settle, and through it no Man or Elf could pass without succumbing. The storms of autumn and winter had never breached the sorcerous wards. Until now.

_Will he need restraining?_

_I think not. This bargain runs both ways. I will leave it to thy judgement._

_I will provide an escort of Men,_ Vanimórë told Elrohir. _Thy brother will be treated with respect._

While no orc directly under Sauron's purview would disobey his orders, and touch the _peredhel_ , they would not curb their tongues, would make his journey unbearable, and might shatter the restraints Elladan placed on himself.

“This one.” Sauron stepped towards Elgalad, his voice dropping. “understands the situation quite well.” He raised a perfect brow. “Do you not?”

Vanimórë did not think Elgalad would reply, but he did, and his voice was astonishingly clear. Neither did he stumble over his words.  
“Thou wilt never break him, Gorthaur. _Never._ ”

“Well, well,” Sauron murmured, then laughed, leaned close to Elgalad, and stared into his eyes for a long moment. Elgalad did not move, and the weight in the room deepened. Elrohir strained like a warhorse at the bit, and Sauron with a tilt of his head to Vanimórë, said, “Come. Time to slay the orcs. We cannot have them believing that they can use thee with impunity.”

The expression that burned into Elrohir's eyes then was inhuman.

 _And so I will kill them quickly,_ Vanimórë thought, still holding Elgalad's wrist, where his blood thundered. _I will not feed thy hunger for violence._

 

~~~

 

He ran, light and fire in his mind, images of burning jewels, of souls who burned brighter, faces he had never seen but dreamed of, and faces he had known since their birth. A voice tolled curses, was answered by flame, by power. He could not see. On instinct he leapt a stone balcony, landed, took a flight of shallow steps three at a time, only halted when he almost collided with some-one. A hand caught him. He tried to shake dark and light from his mental vision. A face traced itself out of the night, wolf-like amber eyes, a loose flood of jet hair. Erestor was naked but for long nightrobe that slipped from one shoulder.

“Tindómion,” he said, knife-edged to cut through the storm in his mind. “I know.”

They were on the wide balcony before Elrond's chambers. Voices came through the open doors. Elrond stood in Glorfindel's clasp, his eyes unfocussed, a frown drawing his brows together. Glorfindel looked over his shoulder, and his glance was gem-blue fire.

“What did you see?” he snapped.

“My sons,” Elrond's voice strained toward snapping.

“They are alive.” Erestor said, less a question than a command.

“Yes.” There was no relief in the word. Elrond pulled away from Glorfindel, paced to the long windows unshuttered on this calm night.

“What did you see, Tindómion?” Glorfindel repeated his question, turned to him.

“It is more what I heard, what I felt.”

Erestor went to a side table and poured from a silver jug of wine. It went down dry, cold, to Tindómion's stomach. He said, “I felt their souls.”

“Yes. Whose?”

“ _All of them._ ” He had thought his heart would burst at their touch, unknown save through a lost father's dreams, all but one. _Ah, Gil._ He had known, for a moment, the measureless despair of the Everlasting Dark, the titan hate and madness of Morgoth — and the passionate, unconquered defiance of the damned.  
“Fëanor.” The name thrummed in his mouth. “Fingolfin.”  
“Yes,” said Glorfindel and Erestor together, and their eyes caught fire from those names.

“But why were they wound with Elladan and Elrohir?”

When Galadriel's warning had reached Elrond, it was already too late. His sons were lost as if sunk under deep water or in gelid fog. Later, they had re-emerged but still blurred, blunted, until this outpouring of power that shocked to the bottom of Tindómion's mind. All their minds. Notes of wrath and fear, defiance and pain poured through them like floodwater, and through it belled the endless clash of a battle that had no witnesses but the dead.

“Galadriel warned him.” Elrond turned. “As did you. That cursed sword — ”

Glorfindel's mouth thinned. “Aícanaro is not a Silmaril, Elrond, nor is it the One Ring. The sword is not to blame for the demon that rides your son's shoulders. But let us not become distracted. What does he want with them?”

“You are sure then,” Erestor said. “that it is Sauron.”

“Galadriel always believed so.”

“So does Mithrandir.”

The Wizard had once penetrated Dol Guldur, and returned to declare that the so-called Necromancer was no Nazgûl, as had long been suspected, but Sauron. Though there was no proof he could bring out, and Sauron had not been there, his word was enough for most. He had urged that the White Council convene and drive the Dark Lord out of his fastness, but Curunír had objected.  
“If it is indeed the old Enemy,” he had said in his ponderous way. “Is it not better that he hide in our sight? He does not know us. If we drive him forth, where do you think he will go? To Mordor, where we cannot follow. From all you have said, Mithrandir, he does very little in Dol Guldur.”

“What he does is enough,” Mithrandir responded sharply, “to warrant our intervention. He grows in power. You have not seen the poison that spreads into the south of the forest, the dead who walk, nor heard the spirits of the wood-Elves who died trying to fight him and who now roam the land seeking to possess their living kin.”

“I have heard,” Curunír responded. “that this is no uncommon thing. If the dead refuse the call to Mandos,” he shrugged. “they are left Houseless. Their choice.”

“If they die in the shadows of Dol Guldur, their souls are twisted.” Mithrandir looked as if he had seen horrors in that place, and some he would never speak of.

Tindómion was unsure even now why they had not struck at Dol Guldur. Perhaps the White Council, or all of it save Glorfindel, were disinclined to rouse themselves to battle. Mithrandir had described the drugging fumes that filled the woods, said that a military attack would be difficult if not impossible; they would come to the same end as the wood-Elves. Since that time however, Galadriel had been watchful and wary. Now the waiting-time was over.

“We know it is Sauron,” Glorfindel said. “Even if he were not in Dol Guldur when Mithrandir entered it, they knew each other in the time before Time. ”

It would have been of benefit to speak to the Wizard, but he was gone east with a group of Dwarves from the Ered Luin and one Hobbit of the western Shire. They would be across the mountains by now, but surely Mithrandir would have sensed that unearthly explosion of power?

“He must be called,” Erestor said. “The time is now.” His eyes gleamed like a wolf's in the lamplight. “If he has to leave the Dwarves, so be it. They are hardy enough to look to themselves.”

“We need to know what he wants with my sons!” Elrond flung round, and Glorfindel opened his mouth to speak, and then gasped as if punched in the gut.

A wind came up, flooded the chamber with scents of earth, moss, water, and running on it a thread of perfume, rich, musky, that teased familiarly at memory. Glorfindel's hair streamed out in a running river of gold. Tindómion caught his own away from his face, stared as his friend's eyes brightened to blazing crystal. Glorfindel's mouth shaped a word and then, as the wind dropped as suddenly as it had begun, he staggered. Tindómion and Erestor steadied him. The perfume lingered on his skin, and the Fëanorion remembered a dream and a long, bloody battlefield. He knew the name he associated with that fragrance.

“ _Vanimórë_ ,” Glorfindel said on a long exhalation of breath, and straightened. Colour bloomed along his cheekbones; his face showed disbelief and fierce challenge. He looked _savage_. “Ah Hells. He is there, in Dol Guldur. He has seen Elladan and Elrohir. Now we know what we face and why. And I think I know, if Vanimórë saw true, what we felt.”

~~~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  [ This refers to events in Chapter 45 of Magnificat I: Starfall. ](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=43&textsize=0&chapter=45)
> 
>  
> 
>  _Belain_ \- The Valar (Sindarin).
> 
>  
> 
> [This was told in Chapter 22 of Dark Prince.](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=27&textsize=0&chapter=22)
> 
>  
> 
> [ Told in Chapter 42 of Dark Prince. ](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=27&textsize=0&chapter=42)
> 
>  
> 
> Curunír - Saruman. Since I use the Elvish Mithrandir for Gandalf, I am using the Elvish Curunír for Saruman.


	7. ~ Blood, Beauty, Love ~

  
**~ Blood, Beauty, Love ~**

 

~The chamber was an arena. Old blood crawled in the air, had stained the once-pale stones, sunk into their grain.

There was no-one in the chamber save the uruks, shifting and flexing at one end of the floor. They were clad in leather and steel, carried swords, but no shields. They saluted as Sauron entered, showed their teeth at Vanimórë. The smell of their fear overlay even that of the blood.

Sauron disposed himself on the dais. Stone seats marched up around and behind him, but they were empty, no doubt on his orders. To fill them with orcs lusting for death would be too great a temptation for Elrohir — and Elgalad too. The water-grey eyes were glacial. Vanimórë had never seen them so cold.

“Here.” Sauron gestured. He looked wholly relaxed as Elrohir and Elgalad took up positions at either side of him, still riding on dangerous power perhaps. Vanimórë walked to the center of the floor. He was still in pain, but had fought when in pain before, and closed an inner door upon it, making it a distant thing. His hurts would heal fast enough, and the uruks were nothing; he would not have to exert himself. With the pain, he shut out hate, and this was often the most difficult. He loathed the orcs, Melkor's brutal and deliberate twisting of beauty. There was no poetry in them, no striving for more than food and drink and sex. They enjoyed violence untempered by any finesse. They were as Men compressed into ugliness and bestiality. To be raped by them was like being pushed whole through a wall of madness, the same madness that now seethed in Elrohir's eyes, where the inner flesh itself vomited with revulsion. But Vanimórë could not permit hatred to ride him when in battle, and felt it weakness to show it. He had learned to beat it flat and lethal as his swords.

They spread out crouching, their blades, longer and heavier than his own, held in grips too tight to allow for anything but hacking strength. Vanimórë simply walked toward them. For a heartbeat they backed then, with ululating roars, surged toward him.

He slammed his blades outward; they clashed with the uruks weapons, who yelled with pain as their wrists absorbed the fury of the blows. The move would have left him vulnerable to the middle uruk had he not brought one weapon back in a sighing blur, shifted aside from the downstroke, and dropped on one knee. One saber drove up into the creature's groin. He fell into a roll past it, came up as the two turned, their weapons held now in their left hands. The other went down, blood jetting from the severed artery. Vanimórë looked into their red eyes and smiled. He stepped back and back again before their wary approach, then he ran, launched himself into a jump, heels smashing into their faces, snapping their necks. He heard the vertebrate crack, spittle spumed from their mouths. He used the leverage to somersault back and land on his feet.

“Hardly worth the time it took to come down here,” Sauron remarked. Elgalad's chest moved in a long sigh, but Elrohir was looking at the dead and dying uruks as if he would have cut them into hunks of meat and still left them alive if he could. Sauron glanced at him, his mouth shifting into a smile.  
“Bring in the others. I think Elrohir has some... aggression he would like to work out of his muscles.”

_I am sure he does._

Vanimórë strode into the corridor where the uruks waited under the flicker of torches. There was eagerness in them, clawed by fear into a rough nap. He jerked his head and they followed him out into the chamber. Sauron beckoned him and Elrohir stepped down. Their eyes met, and if Vanimórë could have felt compassion for the orcs, he would have at that moment.

Elgalad, separated from him by Sauron, turned his head. Vanimórë forced a smile.

Elrohir's slaughter of the orcs was brutal and beautiful, the beauty of the warrior who dances through his movements, who knows them as well as a bard knows the strings of his harp. His thick braid whipped behind him, but though the uruks tried to catch it, he was too fast. Vanimórë measured his movements against all those he had learned in a life of war, his own hands hovering by his sides lest he need go down. He did not have to. The _peredhel_ hacked the uruks to death. He took off an arm, then spun and ducked, sliced through a shin. Aícanaro ululated glee at the killing, a sound beyond hearing, like the cry of a demon from the Void. Elrohir jumped, brought the sword through a neck and shoulder. There should not have been any finesse in such slaughter, but it was there, in Elrohir's whiplash grace, the burn of his eyes, no misstep, not a move wasted and regathered. And the uruks were butchered.

Vanimórë glanced once at Elgalad, whose face showed nothing as Elrohir turned to Sauron. Blood dripped in thick strings from Aícanaro's tip, stippled his white face.

Sauron inclined his head, and Vanimórë saw the minute swell and shift of sinew in Elrohir's body, the thought before the deed, almost simultaneous.

_No!_ he cried into the crimson rage. _He is testing thee. Dost thou not understand? Thou art an experiment._

The pale eyes flashed to his, then dropped. When Elrohir raised them to Sauron he said, “I would see my brother.” And, as if it scalded his palate: “My Lord.”

“Such a display warrants a boon.” He knew; he too had seen the _peredhel_ preparing to attack him. “Vanimórë. Take him to his twin, then come to my chambers. Since the hall is uninhabitable, we will enjoy a pleasant, intimate meal together. Come, Elgalad.” He rose. This was Sauron at his most urbane, with light mockery spicing each word and action. It threw Elrohir and Elgalad off balance. They did not know how to react to this elegant man with the poise of a king in this room where the charnal reek of death was thick as smoke. Whom invited them to sup with him. Fearful, because even now he could never tell which way this cat would jump, Vanimórë pressed reassurance into Elgalad's eyes, then realized all Elgalad's own fear was for him.

_As mine is for him, and Elrohir's for his brothers, which is just what Sauron wants._

Elrohir cleaned his sword, standing in the midst of death, and sheathed it. He dropped the cloth into a pool of blood, and only then raised his eyes to Vanimórë. He did not speak as they left the chamber, ascended the steps. The hallways were empty; they rose through two levels, the curl of the walls, the exuberant carvings flowing around them like dimmed memories of the time Oropher had raised his fortress here, when Elves had walked these passages. At the top of a short flight of steps, Vanimórë stopped.  
“Permit me to advise thee. Wait until thy brother is safe. Come, thou canst wash before seeing him.” He raised a hand to a streak of blood the cloth had not reached.

Elrohir averted his head in an arrogant gesture.  
“My brother has seen orc blood before.” His voice was frigid. “I will see him now.”

Vanimórë lowered his hand, trod up the steps. Elladan was held in the same room he had woken in. The only difference now were the guards, two of Vanimórë's Easterlings, who stood at the door. On seeing him they saluted, opened and unbarred it. Elrohir glanced at Vanimórë.  
“I will see him alone,” he stipulated.

“Of course. And I will wait for thee.”

Elrohir gave him the full force of his contempt. He said, “How do you live with yourself?”

Vanimórë shrugged away the question.  
“Revile me if thou wilt, but listen: Thou hast made it far too easy for him already. Thine emotions are like fire, and he feels them. Better to hide something, if only for thyself, as a refuge. He gave thee those orcs as a sop, knowing thy loathing of them. Yes — ” as Elrohir turned the handle of the door impatiently. “And he watched thy pleasure in slaying them. And so he will give thee more until thou art little more than a beast he uses to kill. Like them.”

“And like you?” Elrohir pulled open the door, slammed it behind him.

~~~

Elladan was chained, but there was a suggestion of laxness in the loops of steel that ran into the wall. He could stand, sit, walk a few paces, pour himself wine. His attitude of watchful aggression melted as he saw Elrohir. They embraced, then drew back to trace one another's features, looking for sign of hurt. Elrohir had not seen Elladan since he had made his offer to Sauron, and a hard sob swelled in his throat. He forced in down.

“What happened?” Elladan asked.

“I killed orcs.” A sop, Vanimórë had said. Did it matter? “You will be taken from here in the morning. Vanimórë will escort you.” Which was better, he admitted to himself, than orcs.

“And I will come back.” The lantern hissed and wavered, filled Elladan's eyes with light. “I go for you, and return for you.”

“I know.” He leaned his brow against his brother's. They were trembling. It was shock, Elrohir knew, their minds grappling with something monstrous and impossible.  
“I am sorry.”

“For what?”

“For this.” He turned away, watched the dance of flames in the brazier. The room was not cold, yet it seemed so; cold, gloomy, abandoned somewhere out of time. Elrohir quashed a shiver, remembering the vision of he and his brother reduced to beasts in some forgotten hole. His voice held an accretion of horror.  
“I had to make the choice. I would make it again.”

Elladan caught his arm, pulled him about. “You had no right,” he said. “None. And I would have done the same.”

“Just go with them, and be safe.” It was no revelation to Elrohir to find that he cared for his brother more than any-one, but he wanted Elladan gone for that reason. He could not set himself against Sauron were Elladan the knife at his throat. Sauron surely knew that, or did he think an oath made under duress should be cleaved to? No matter. With his twin gone, he had room to maneuver. And if there was none, he would make it.

“I go _for_ you.” The chains clinked as Elladan raised his hands to Elrohir's face. His high-riding anger gathered strength at the sound, then faltered helplessly against the vision of Elladan gelded and enslaved.  
“The White Council tarried too long. Now we will drive him out, and free you.” His look pushed behind Elrohir's eyes, into his soul, a promise, and love that was undeserved, so desperately needed. “He will not have you. Only be careful.”

“Careful,” Elrohir repeated with mordant amusement biting deep.

“I know you.”

Yes, he knew that once he was beyond Sauron's reach, Elrohir would do anything to escape, even if that way meant death. Perhaps Sauron could break them and chain their souls to their bodies, but if Elrohir died, he had _a choice._ The Gift of Men.

He did not say this, not even into the deep, secret communication that they shared. He did not need to. Elladan's manacled hands moved to his shoulders, gripped savagely.

“No,” he said. _The Galadhrim will be waiting for us. I will go to our grand-dam. Father will know something has happened. Just_ wait for me. _I am not letting you go, I will not let you take that road, Elrohir! I go so that I may not be used against you, but I will_ never _leave you._

He laid a hand over Elrohir's heart, which tore because _I am not worth this..._ and he closed his eyes against the soft darkness of his brother's hair.

~~~

There would be no feast that night. The spring dusk came down in silence, and the King withdrew to his chambers with his son, Bainalph and Gwathel. Thranduil and Legolas were the only ones who heard Elgalad's plea riding on the skirts of the storm. _Do not come for me!_ he had warned, and shown them Dol Guldur, the events that had passed there. Everything.  
The King considered telling no-one but Gwathel and the few like her would be needed, must know what they might face. As for Bainalph, Elgalad had been with him before he vanished; it would be foolish, Thranduil thought, to exclude him.   
  
“The Houseless were in terror, even the enslaved.” Gwathel accepted the wine Bainalph offered her. Her fingers gripped the silver tightly. Fear had scorched through her, left its shadow in her bones. “And there are Úlairi.” Icy hatred in her voice. “They are coming.”   
  
Bainalph looked at Thranduil, who said with the same chill bite: “They will not enter the kingdom.”   
  
The wraiths had, in fact, never crossed the borders of the realm, but Thranduil's powers were deeply intertwined with his kingdom and kingship. He could not protect those who moved beyond his influence.   
  
Across the table, Legolas met Bainalph's eyes. Who said, sweetly, “ _You_ cannot go, Sire.” There was no question but that some-one would. Thranduil flicked frustrated fury at him, and turned to Gwathel.   
“What else can you tell us?” he asked. “Elgalad does not know what came to pass.”   
  
“Something reached into this world from beyond.” Her brows crooked. “I am still feeling it. It was like a stone thrown into a pool, with ripples running out from the centre. But that centre...” A shudder gripped her. “That was not death, Sire, it was nothingness, and _nothing_ is what should have existed within it.”   
  
“But something did,” the King stated.   
  
“There was power. It almost broke into the world.” She drank. “But the door — for so I must call it — was closed.”   
  
“Whatever it was, Elgalad survived it, and the sons of Elrond.” Legolas went to his father's side. “I felt something...”   
  
“What?”   
  
Bainalph watched puzzlement drift across Legolas' face.   
“It was almost as if one of the Houseless were near.” He traced the air with his fingers. “A soul, bright and dark as ruby, great pain, greater hate.”  
  
Gwathel nodded. “I felt it too. And there were others, burning.”   
  
“Well,” the King said. “We must decide. And there is little time. Elgalad has been in Sauron's power too long already.”   
  
Elgalad it was now clear, had always known about his guardian, which was why he never spoke of him. _Slave of Sauron._ It explained too, why Sauron wanted Elgalad; there was a bond between he and the Slave. Vanimórë. _Beautiful darkness._ Elgalad was to be his shackles. Vanimórë was a less-than-perfect servant, would have to be to raise Elgalad from childhood, love him, and bring him to the forest. He would try to aid Elrond's sons if he could.   
  
“There is nothing to decide,” Bainalph said.   
  
“Sauron wants Elvenblood servants.” Thranduil's mouth curled with distaste. He braced his hands on the table. “You will be captured or killed as many others before you. There must be another way.”   
  
“Sire,” Gwathel spoke. “The Houseless say there is no mist about Dol Guldur now.”   
  
That had always been the true barrier, not the Úlairi, not even Sauron, but the toxic fog. No mask seemed to be able to entirely keep it out. Thranduil had long guessed that Sauron or his minions pumped the substances from the guts of the fortress, that it was less sorcery than narcotic, and the Houseless had confirmed it. But knowing it helped little; the healers had tried to find herbs to counteract it, but their efficacy could only be tested by frequent proximity to Dol Guldur, and that the King was not willing to consider. Now, if the situation had changed, Thranduil _had_ to investigate.   
  
“The Dark Lord has one of my people, and the mists are gone. He will be expecting us to come, as we have before. If I take my army and he uses the poison — ?” He slapped his hands down on the wood. “There is too much we do not know. I cannot and will not risk it.”   
  
“Father—” Legolas began.   
  
“No,” Thranduil said, and the word fell like the last stone over a tomb. He moved across to his son. “You know I cannot risk it.” The pain and passion in his voice broke its restraints. “Dol Guldur's poison makes us as drunken Men. We die and are enslaved. No man or woman trapped by Sauron's power has sung the soul-song or escaped enslavement after death.”   
  
Legolas' eyes fumed. Bainalph waited a moment, then said calmly: “I am Alphgarth, as you are the Wood. I can confuse and elude the Úlairi. I can at least see what is happening there.” He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “Elgalad is no tyro. If he can escape, he will. But some-one should be there to help him if he does.”   
  
“Will he even try to escape?” the king snapped. “If Sauron threatens his 'lord'? And do you not think Sauron can see into Elgalad's mind?”   
  
“Nevertheless.”   
  
All of them were staring at him.   
  
“How many would you take?”   
  
“None.” Bainalph saw the protest rise to Legolas' lips. “One may be overlooked when a greater number would not be. It may indeed be a trap to entice us. _He_ will expect us to send many.”   
  
When no-one, not even the king, spoke, he went to the doors, pulled them open, and strode along the hall toward his guest chambers.   
  


~~~

Thranduil came later, in deep night, after Bainalph had spoken to Gwathel, and only to her. It was not a matter of trust — Sauron had captured other Elves beside Elgalad, and knew everything he needed to know about the Woodland Realm, save perhaps its ancient magic — but were Bainalph to announce his going to Dol Guldur there would be protest. Half Alphgarth would want to accompany him.

“Two days,” he had told Gwathel. “Then you may tell our people here, and your brother in Alphgarth. On my command, none must follow me.”

“My prince,” she said. “No-one can help you if you fall into his hands. He has what he wanted. And I think the King is right. Elgalad will not attempt to escape if the Dark One threatens this one he loves.”

He took her hands. “Whether or no, I have to try.”

She bent her head. Her grip was strong, sinewy. “I know.”

Now, Bainalph offed his clothes, unbound his hair, twisting it into a loose knot, then laid out the gear he would need to travel. When the outer door opened, closed again behind the silent arrival, he stiffened as at the touch of flame on his spine.  
“Sire.”

The king's eyes skimmed away from Bainalph's nakedness.  
“Have you taken any thought,” he said hardly. “to what will happen if you die?”

“Of course.” Bainalph put up his brows. “And so I have you. I have no heirs, so Alphgarth will go to you. There will be no objection; it is part of the realm after all.”

Thranduil lifted a dagger from the table, turned it. The candle-light spilled over the bright steel, the incised pattern of ravens wings.  
“Fool,” he said, without emotion. “You should have got heirs.”

“My tastes run one way only.”

The knife blade flared light into the king's eyes so that they burned like fiery ice. He set it down.  
“You have never seen Dol Guldur. You know not what you face.”

It was true. Bainalph had been ordered to hold Alphgarth. He had not joined that first, terrible attack on the fortress nor any of the subsequent patrols. He said, “I have heard enough. I have seen maps.”

Thranduil paced. Bainalph leaned against the table.  
“There is no alternative, and no-one else save Legolas who could elude the wraiths. And you have to deflect them from the realm.”

The King tipped back his head, and swore.  
“If Elgalad had told us the truth of his _golodh_ , we could have watched him, warned him.”

“It would have made no difference,” Bainalph said softly. “If he called, this Vanimórë, Elgalad would go to him. And you know why he did not. I believe he thought we would hate Vanimórë, and such is Elgalad's love and trust that he could not bear that. And thus, he never spoke of him.”

“Well, what could one think of a _golodh_ in service to Sauron? But it was not he who called Elgalad.”

“Sauron is a master at deception. And Elgalad's mind was unwary.” He picked up the knife, thrust it into its sheath. “It troubles me that he knew the best time for such an attempt.”

The King paused, his profile hard and fine against the embroidered arras.  
“He has been watching us.”

“We knew that.” He had even sent the dead under his dominion, which was why the shade-speakers like Gwathel, and Thranduil's binding with his realm were vital. The King could repulse them, but such power demanded something in payment, hence the rites of the Summer and Winter King. And so Thranduil was tied to his realm. Bainalph knew that he himself might become one of those Houseless, slave to the Dark Lord. He was prepared for that, as much as any-one could be, but it was not simply a question of taking his own life. He had to ensure that his soul was not bound.

“Will you,” he asked, with some diffidence, “be ready to call my spirit?” He made a gesture. “I cannot ask any-one else, you understand.”  
The silence was long. Too long. He had not wanted to ask, but they had always been able to surmount their past when politics was the issue. This skirted the edge of it, for houseless and damned, Bainalph could be a danger to Alphgarth, could bring madness to its people. It had taken the wood-Elves some time to realize that the only way to prevent soul-bondage was if some-one they loved and trusted beckoned them at the moment of death. They knew, through the shade-speakers, that there was one other who called their souls, some dark maw far away. The _golodhrim_ said this summoner was Mandos, in whose halls the dead waited for rebirth. But there was something too eager, too voracious behind that doorway, so said the Houseless.

Thranduil looked at him fully, and Bainalph searched for something, anything in his eyes, a morsel of regard. He saw nothing. As if it did not matter, was some small favour, the king said briefly: “I will.”

It was enough. It had to be. “You have my thanks.”

“Perhaps you could try not to die. Alphgarth needs you.” Thranduil walked to a side table and poured wine into two goblets, offered one. Bainalph took it. His hands, he noted with relief, were steady. It took all he had to be alone with the man whom had so violently spurned him.  
“Every warrior in the Wood faces death.” He held the power and anger behind the King's eyes. “There is only Legolas or me, and you cannot risk him.”

“No. I _will not_ risk him.”

Bainalph took his breeches, shook out the soft doeskin, and slid them on.  
“I have another favour to ask.” He nodded to a table where stood the pot of ink and drawing sticks that would mark his war tattoos. The King, without speaking, drew the fighting swan over his forehead and cheeks. The ink had peculiar properties: It dried instantly, and water would not wash it away. The tattoos would only fade when battle was over. It also provided a form of camouflage, dimming the gleam of an Elf's flesh, which enemies could so easily see at night. Old magic.

When he had finished, Bainalph fastened his tunic. To his astonishment, Thranduil moved behind him, and unspeaking, combed and braided his hair, drawing it back from his face. He inserted the three black raven feathers that told of Bainalph's _Ithiledhil_ blood. Then came the belt and harness. Bainalph had restrung his bow, fletched his arrows, his knives were sharpened. He had packed dried meat and fruit for the journey , not wishing to pause to hunt. In the south of the forest anyhow, game had become increasingly rare save for the black squirrels, and their flesh was bitter.

The lamp guttered. Bainalph did not replenish the oil. He let the shadows come. They hid the coiling of fear in his gut.

There was another way out of the halls. Thranduil had not forgotten Doriath, and had ensured a way of escape, used the power of the land to hide it. No-one but one of his subjects could have found the exit, hidden by ferns and heather, by trees. It came out to the north. The night air was sweet with spring.

Neither had spoken a word. Now Bainalph turned to the King and said under the susurrus of the leaves: “I do not intend to die.”

“Intention or no, you will die unless you fear.”

“How little you know me.” Bainalph smiled. “I know enough to fear.”

There was a pause. The King laid his hand on Bainalph's breast. Heat shocked through him.  
“May the Earth hold you and guard you, and come safe back to the Land.” The ancient invocation.

“May the Earth bring me back,” Bainalph responded quietly. “Thank-you, Sire.” He bowed, turned away.

“Bainalph.” There was something strange in his voice.

He looked back. Thranduil's arms locked about him, pulled him into a kiss that dissolved his bones, turned him soft and supple as a fern, and hotter than a smith's forge. He bent back under the onslaught, melted as a candle melts into wax. The king's passion rose like the Forest River in winter, fed by rains of lust. Bainalph would have gone down then, on the secret flowers and loam, had Thranduil not held him upright and, with a breathless curse, dragged his mouth away.

Bainalph panted, willed his muscles to hold him. He could see Thranduil clearly, knew that his own face was lost in the weave of night-shadow under the battle tattoos. The King's expression was strained. A flush painted his high cheekbones.  
“Go,” he whispered.

Bainalph gathered himself. It was difficult, after that. He padded through the undergrowth until tall beeches latticed overhead. Control had returned, and with it his purpose. If he could release Elgalad, his own life was a small price to pay. And Thranduil had promised to summon his soul. In life or in death, they could never truly be parted.

He took to the trees, feeling those the Elves had protected through the storm, and he ran. And, as he did so, he let his mind touch the forest, listened to the whispers. He knew, had seen Legolas' eyes. The prince would not waste time arguing with his father, he would simply follow his own sworn purpose.

He came with the failing of the night, invisible, silent, only the warmth of his body, and flower-grass fragrance heralded his arrival on the wide branch. His teeth gleamed white.

“Who drew your marks?” Bainalph asked. No warrior drew their own.

“Gwathel.” Legolas sank down beside him, balanced on the balls of his feet. “And she said that you had forbidden any of Alphgarth to follow you. I am not of Alphgarth, and you have not the authority to command me.”

Bainalph did not know what the King would do when he discovered his son's absence.  
“But I have seniority.” He laid the back of his hand against Legolas' cheek. “And I would rather die in the depths of Dol Guldur than return without you, Legolas.”

Legolas turned his head, kissed Bainalph's fingers. “Neither of us are going to die,” he stated, and light, dripping through the fretwork of leaves, caught the jewels of his eyes. He rose.  
“Let us go.”

~~~


	8. ~ The Heart of Power ~

  
**~ The Heart of Power ~**

Vanimórë poured the wine. Even that simple action held a grace long trapped in the memory of his muscles. Whilst Melkor could tolerate the more brutish of his creations when they served his purpose, he demanded elegance in those he chose to serve him more intimately. This, Sauron had taught his son, and what Vanimórë learned he did not forget.  
  
A branch of candles flickered, incense smoked, scenting the air with the odour of myrrh. Sauron could scarce have endured Dol Guldur without Vanimórë's twice-yearly trade journeys that brought luxuries (and what Sauron considered necessities) to the dreary place.  
  
“They have wasted him,” he mused as Vanimòrë proferred the silver goblet and tilted a brow. “Elrohir. But then, there was always more than a touch of madness in the Finwëions.”  
  
Vanimórë shrugged one shoulder.  
“I met his father, briefly. The madness does not come from him.”  
  
Sauron had seen, in his son's memories, the aftermath of the siege of Barad-dûr. Elrond's refusal to harm Isildur by forcing him to give up the One Ring amused Sauron now, though there had been nothing even remotely amusing about the situation at the time. Indeed, so diminished was he, that he had been forced to concede Vanimórë had been correct in his assessment of the Ring: _Power should be held in oneself alone,_ he had said long ago. But nothing less would have served and, as it was, it had not served him. The Elves had torn themselves away from his influence, but had they destroyed the One Ring itself...  
  
He savoured the rich smoothness of the wine. Even that fate would not be as devastating as either his son or the Elves hoped. In his own way, Vanimórë was like the Void, a power-source but one Sauron knew how to use without peril. They were blood-kin and so long as Vanimórë lived (and he had made survival into an art) Sauron could draw on him.  
  
Night lay over the fortress. The prisoners had been taken to their own rooms after a meal that made Sauron want to laugh long and loud, such were the undercurrents. All of them bound by chains of threat, they had formed one of the most unlikely gatherings he had ever been privileged to witness. He tasted the tumult of their minds while conversing with his son, the only one there beside himself who seemed inclined to talk. They spoke of distant cities, rulers, armies, the topic deliberately chosen. Sauron wanted the pith of it to reach his enemies ears: the West was not the whole of the world, and Sauron's influence extended into faraway lands. After, when Vanimórë escorted them to their rooms, Sauron had succumbed to mirth.  
  
“Elrohir would have thrown Isildur into the fire,” Vanimórë said with a glance under long lashes. “And might have gone with him. He will destroy himself before he allows thee to mould him.”  
  
Sauron shrugged, allowing the velvet robe to slip off one shoulder. He spread his free hand flat on the white fur beneath him, soft and opulent.  
“You did not,” he pointed out. Vanimórë showed his teeth.  
“I had nothing else. Elrohir has. And they will never let thee keep him.”  
  
“Galadriel's grandson.” Sauron had long come to the conclusion that Finarfin's daughter held some great power in that golden forest across the river. He was unable to see into it, and had picked apart the threads of possibility by process of elimination. Always a woman of extraordinary strength, (and ever chary of him in his guise as Annatar) he nonetheless doubted that she could have closed her realm to his sight unless her powers were augmented — by one of the Three Rings. It made sense. She was an obvious choice of guardian. His mouth bent dryly. To the very end, Celebrimbor had refused to tell him of the Three's whereabouts, much to Sauron's regret.  
  
 _And what grace did you buy, my erstwhile friend,_ he wondered? remembering the once-magnificent Fëanorion impaled on a spear, head lolling in a cloud of blood-clotted hair. _None. Your people are almost gone, only a few hidden in forests and valleys, waiting on the shores of the sea. And you, I now know, burn in the Void._  
The twin's minds had showed him much he had been uncertain of. He had spies, but they did not see everything.  
  
“Not let me keep him,” he repeated. “And how do you think they could force me to release him? This White Council?” There had been whispers of it before. He had drawn it from the minds of the few warriors of Lórinand that had strayed into the jaws of Dol Guldur, but none had proved such a font of knowledge as the _peredhil_ twins.  
  
“Thou hast underestimated both Elves and Men before.”  
  
 _Their stubbornness, certainly._  
  
“You see yourself in him.”  
  
Vanimórë looked up. His face was still; no punishment, no pain could pinch the lush curves of his mouth, darken the vivid eyes. Shadows lay under his high cheekbones. There was indeed a likeness to Elrohir in the arrogant structure of his face, though to the best of Sauron's knowledge, Vanimórë's mother had not been Finwëion.  
  
“My demons are real. His dwelt in his mind. Until now.”  
  
“Until now,” Sauron echoed. “Sometimes I think I should pity the Noldor.” At his son's expression, he laughed. “Thrown like offal into the Everlasting Dark for daring to love another man or, if a woman, another woman.”  
Vanimórë had been offered sanctuary by Manwë and refused it, which surprised Sauron not at all. His son had learned pleasure with both men and women, determined that his usage would not affect his ability to enjoy sex. If Manwë thought that he would bow his head and repent of it, the fool had learned nothing. But then, most of the Valar had never wanted to _understand_ either Elves or Men. Sauron remembered the Music, when the Ainur had seen the coming of the Children. There had been fascination, wonder, covetousness aplenty, but little desire to comprehend.  
  
“Damned and doomed to one mate or celibacy and so, when Elrohir felt desire on seeing his mother raped, it became a monstrous and unspeakable guilt.” Sauron sipped the wine and set it aside. He beckoned, and Vanimórë came to the great bed. “He does not understand that it is quite normal, and no-one has told him.”  
  
“I have never desired to rape.”  
  
“A paladin.” Sauron snapped the ties that bound his hair. “But you have known the battle-lust, and been able to ease yourself. He has not, I think. Not even to pleasure himself. If he wants you, you will...accommodate him.”  
  
Not a flicker stirred the beautiful face.  
“If he does so it will be in hate and violence. He finds me disgusting. The healing he needs is not in me, and I think he will eat himself alive.”  
  
“He finds himself disgusting, hates you for surviving what his mother did not, as you know.” He twisted a swathe of long hair, tugged on it. “Sometimes I think you have come to like violence, a punishment for your... _service_.”  
  
Vanimórë turned his head. “Perhaps,” he said, giving nothing. “But Elrohir will go mad if thou doth treat him as I.”  
  
“It would be interesting to see if that is so.”  
  
And now there was a flicker.  
“Then what in the Hells is the point of this, _my Lord_?”  
  
Sauron shrugged. “There is always,” he said. “vengeance.”  
  
“Vengeance runs both ways. They have never forgiven thee, never will. Not for Finrod, not for Celebrimbor or Gil-galad.”  
  
“Well, I am hoping for _some_ reaction.” He untied his robe, let it fall beside his thighs, and gave himself up to the skill of Vanimórë's mouth. He sank his hands into the mane of jet hair, and when he came to release, its intensity tore a curse from him. His son was not the only one here whom had vowed to find pleasure after rape.  
  
“When you return from the border,” he said. “Ensure your men are ready to leave on short notice. I do not want any of you around when battle is joined.”  
  
Vanimórë rose. “How thoughtful of thee.” He drained his wine. His lips were ripe from their employment, hair falling in coils over his shoulders. His eyes smouldered with resentment. Sauron enjoyed looking at him.  
“The orcs, too?”  
  
“The orcs stay.” He sat up. “They are expendable. And I suppose I should make _some_ effort, give them something to kill, this White Council. Now go. Report to me when you return. Elgalad will remain with me, as will Elrohir.” He smiled, touched Vanimórë's cheek. “ _All_ you have to do is follow my orders, and no harm will come to Elgalad.”  
  
“Sire.” Vanimórë bowed. Words wrestled in his throat, and Sauron read them. “I could leave him here.” He plucked the threads of an old fear. “A place so deep, so wound about with power he would never be found.” His son's sinews went taut. “It would be a waste, would it not? Go.”  
  
The heavy door shut behind him. Sauron settled back against cushions brought from Khand, and considered. He thought of Vanimórë's head bent over him, his own over Melkor. At first, and for a long time, Melkor had been glorious, painfully beautiful. But he considered every-one inferior to him, and had never learned to think in less than vast schemes. Perhaps he could not. Unfortunately, what Sauron considered his greatest mistake could never be undone. Melkor should never have killed Finwë, never made an enemy of the Elves. Although he had no proof save in his own mind, Sauron believed the Valar were complicit in that matter. In his hatred Melkor had come up against the one person whose spirit overmatched him: Fëanor, and though he was long dead, his passion lived on. Even in the Void.  
  
 _And that battle is not over._  
  
It had been a mistake. The Valar were happy to let the Noldor face Melkor in Middle-earth, because while they tied up his forces, he could not look West to Aman, which should have been his goal. The Noldor would have served him well as allies, save that it had been proved over and over they served no-one.  
  
Melkor, fallen from might and the beauty of stars...Sauron had seen something broken in him on his return from imprisonment. Had the Valar truly thought that cutting him off from everything and every-one but his own self for three Ages would bring their errant brother to heel?  
  
 _And that would have been my lot, had I come before the Valar._  
  
They had no right. Little ado had they with Middle-earth until enough blood had drenched the rich soil of Beleriand. The thought of Vanimórë contemptuously rebuffing their offer of sanctuary would always make him laugh. He did laugh for a moment, then considered Elrohir saw, in a crimson flash, that haughty head crowned, a ring upon his finger, stone pulsing red as old blood. Pale hair streamed across his inner vision, across Elrohir, with a flash of leaf-green eyes, a beautiful face. Strange, finely drawn markings coiled and stretched; a dragon moved over fair skin. Sauron's amusement pinched out. Like all Maia, he was subject to foresight and oftentimes it was vague, disturbing. As was this. The _peredhil_ bound as the Nazgûl were? A new Witchking? That would mean something had happened to Mûrazôr. He felt his brows contract. Could the son of Elrond slay his servants? The will was there, but the power...? And who was the Elf? Not Elgalad. There were no tattoos on his body, though it was a Silvan custom as Sauron knew from those whom had died in the shadows of Dol Guldur. He knew, too, why the wood-Elves marked themselves and guessed why Elgalad did not. He did not care if he were not identified after death.  
  
He rose. The night beyond the tower lay silent as a tombstone. Sauron had never liked the place, but it had almost served its purpose. He unlatched the shutters, pushed open the leaded glass. Of all the chambers in Dol Guldur only his own possessed windows that opened. The smog that belched forth from the deep pipes did not affect him. Now the engines lay quiet, and would forever more. He had killed the workers, Men little more than orcs, wits be-numbed, skin grimed black, eyes dull under shags of hair.  
  
A faint breeze drifted from the forest, not stagnant water and rot, but green as summer, a wind that had blown through leaves, stroked the chuckle of a clear stream, taken the perfume from flowers. White-gold hair rippled through the gloom. A Nazgûl shrieked from far away. Sauron tapped his fingers thoughtfully on the stone embrasure, then closed the window fast.  
  
 _Let us see,_ he thought to those who even now ranged against him. _What you can do._  
  


~~~

Elrohir had suffered nightmares when he was young, before he learned to control his dreams. He felt now as he had then: helpless. There was no escape, a sense of awful unreality. And this time, there was no waking.  
His brother was gone with Vanimórë. Elrohir judged it would take two days to reach the border at a good pace. He would know when Elladan was free, and was awaiting that moment with a dreadful anticipation.

_If Sauron reneges and he is killed, I will know._

That thought had ambushed him in the darkest hours. He imagine Elladan walking away from the woods, into the sun, an arrow chasing him, striking his back. For all Elrohir knew this might be some cruel, elaborate game. And so he had forced himself through his pride to ask Vanimórë that morning

He had not been asleep when the door to his chamber was unlocked, when Vanimórë entered with a young man, a soldier by his gear, carrying a tray. The youth looked frightened, and was trying to hide it. Elrohir glimpsed another waiting in the hallway.

There was something too normal in the ritual of bringing food, too comforting in the smell of fresh bread. He did not know what he had expected. Not this.

“Eat and drink.” Vanimórë closed the door behind the solider. “Thou wilt need to function with all thy wits and strength about thee. I will take thy brother his meal, and escort him from the forest. Thou wilt be able to say thy farewells.”

Elrohir ignored the food. “Do you have orders to kill him?” he asked, holding the strange eyes with his own.

“He wants to test thy people, this White Council.” Elrohir felt a flash of shock, and Vanimórë's mouth tilted up in a cynical half-smile. “Thou canst not hide aught from him when thou art so close, remember that. _Test_ them. If either of thee were to die, I think that they would never rest until they had brought him down.”

The White Council. Yes, they would move now, or at least some of them. Curunír, ensconced in far Isenguard, always counseled caution, patience, according to Glorfindel.

“I have no orders to harm thy twin,” Vanimórë told him, and sounded sincere, though what was that worth in this place? “Sauron wants thee alive, serving him. If thy brother were to die, he would have no hold on thee, would he?”

“He may have no hold on me any-how.” Because despite his brother, his determination was veering more and more toward that last, final choice. He could not, he knew, serve Sauron as Vanimórë did and keep his sanity. And his death might be the one thing that would move _all_ the White Council. Elrohir did not believe, in his heart, that Curunir or perhaps even Galadriel would show forth their long-hidden powers to rescue him, or not his living body, but his death might sway them. Perhaps he erred, but he had seen how his grandam looked at him, seen the expression in her eyes, and heard her words. He wondered if one day he would be sent against her, against Lórien, armed in black, Aicanáro smiling its red-black joy at death. Shivering, he buried the image under the glowing coal at the center of his soul. Vanimórë was watching him, and Elrohir saw unfathomable compassion in his eyes. He could not bear it, not from this man.

“I would bury that thought very deep,” Vanimórë said, and stepped close to him. Elrohir would not give ground; antagonism burned over his flesh in a hot, prickling rush.  
“ _He knows._ And if he thinks thou art decided on suicide he will have no use for thy brother at all. One or both of thee dead, what difference would it make to him?”

Elrohir tamped down his hatred to speak, snapping the words off like icicles.  
“If he sees so much, knows so much, then he knows that I _cannot_ serve him.”

“Well, he has never attempted this before. One never knows until one tries. He has always enjoyed...experimentation.” The smile was shockingly like Sauron's own in its coldness. “But there is more hope for thee in life than in death.”

Elrohir shifted aside, anticipating the movement of Vanimórë's hand on his shoulder. He said, with what he heard as blistering arrogance: “You do not have permission to touch me, _coward._ ”

Vanimórë's expression remained unchanged, but his eyes went dark to black. Like a far-off war trumpet, Elrohir felt power, as if the sky tore itself apart far away. All the air in the room seemed to carry the charge of a storm.

“Forgive me.” A wry smile folding one corner of his mouth. “Thou art quite right. I am indeed a coward, but I also know of what I speak.” He opened the door without haste. The two young men waiting in the passageway bowed, raising a clenched fist to brow and breast. “These are Ryath and Kirin, and will serve thee while I escort thy brother. They speak Westron, but no Sindarin. Try not to alarm them too much,” he added. “This is their first time in Dol Guldur.”

Elrohir quashed a desire to do violence that would breach Vanimórë equanimity. He glanced impatiently at the men who, in his estimation, had seen a score of years, if that. They were clean shaven, hair drawn back into horsetails, with faintly slanted dark eyes. Like the other warriors Elrohir had seen in Dol Guldur, their faces were more delicate than the Men of the West, cheekbones high and smooth under olive-gold skin. They wore black, as did Vanimórë, well-made mail and leather, bore two swords, and daggers at thigh and hip. Elrohir knew he could disarm them both without effort, but to what purpose?

“Is there aught thou doth desire to know before I depart?” Vanimórë asked, brows faintly raised.

“Nothing,” Elrohir returned.  
There was of course, there were a thousand things he needed to know, and pride choked him.

~~~

_More dangerous, less wise,_ said the Noldor of the Silvan Elves. Elrohir had heard they were fey, lavish in their carnality, bedding men and women both without guilt or binding. Once he had been fascinated by the thought, now it twisted something in the pit of his belly, a knot of shame and fugitive desire.

Elgalad's face was pure as a spring dawn. It was impossible to imagine him engaged in orgiastic pleasures, save for something behind those limpid eyes that gave the lie to innocence. Elrohir recalled how he had looked in chains, kneeling before Sauron's throne, and he shuddered.

“Tell me,” he said, to combat it. “How do you come to know him, Vanimórë?”

Elgalad lifted his head; all that silver hair, like new minted coins. And told him. It was an extraordinary tale, and at the end of it, Elrohir was silent for a long time. The telling was soft and bright on Elgalad's face. The love. Elrohir had seen it when he walked into the Great Hall, though the subsequent events had banished it from his mind, but he had seen it too when he entered Elgalad's chamber. The only person whom had ever looked at him with such fierce love was his twin. He had never seen it in the eye of any-one else, not for one living. Only for the dead. Erestor for whom he did not know, though he was no fool and might guess. Glorfindel, whose name was linked with Ecthelion of the Fountain, and (in hushed, secret whispers) to Fëanor himself, Tindómion, and there was no secret whom he had loved. Gil-galad's grave, a white marble slab, lay unfading as memory in Imladris.

“Our passions live in the past,” Erestor had said once. “The dead hold them.”

There had been the trace of a bitter, mocking smile on his mouth, and Elrohir had not believed him, or had not wanted to. It was the first time he had heard the saying _More dangerous, less wise_ applied to the Silvan Elves. Elrohir had been young then, before Sauron's spirit regathered itself from the ashes of Orodruin, before Angmar rose in the North. Before his mother was taken, and broken.  
They had been trying to explain, Erestor and Glorfindel, the Laws of the Valar, with Tindómion, fire running under his stony expression, listening. It had been somehow easier to talk to them than to his father, even to Elladan. Anyhow, he and his twin were so bound, that there was no need to speak. Yet it was a serious matter. There were the Laws, and there was their bloodline which required them to make a choice: the life of the Elves or of Men. If they were to marry, they must take that into consideration.

But Elrohir had no thoughts of marriage. He was afflicted with the curse that ran through his Finwëion blood. It was men who roused him. They knew these three who, one summer evening, had taken him into their circle.

In the end, they all looked at Tindómion, who was not seeing them at all. After a moment he collected himself. The silver eyes Erestor said he had inherited from his father, fixed upon Elrohir. Whose mouth had dried, and whose heart was sore.

“They have no right, but they chain us anyhow,” he said. “Only remember that the price cannot be paid by one alone.”

Erestor, his mouth still curled in an old, aching pain said, “The Silvans are not so constrained.”

“We do not know that,” Glorfindel interposed, and broke the tableaux with his bright warrior's grace. All of them were famed and all of them, Elrohir thought, carried anguish he could not understand or comprehend. “Those who never went to Valinor may not come under the Laws. I would like to think so. Even they do not know.”

“How do you know that?” Erestor asked with a lift of his brows.

“Galadriel,” Glorfindel said briefly, and to Elrohir: “You know there are Silvans in Lothlórien. She does not appoint herself guardian of their...morals. But I asked her, a long time ago, what they believed.”

It was, Elrohir realised later, rare that the subject was discussed and he wished that he had not brought it up. His cheeks were afire,and the commingling of rage, undimmed by time, and grief was too heavy a load for his youthful heart. But he did not excuse himself and leave. This was his heritage, too.

“ _They_ believe they are unhoused, that their spirits walk the lands they love.” Glorfindel handed them summer-wine.

Elrohir shivered in the warm-milk air. It was said that the Houseless were perilous, ever seeking to join with a living body.

“More dangerous,” Erestor quoted, without censure. “Less wise. Or are they? Are you considering finding yourself a Silvan lover?” He blinked like a cat. Glorfindel threw him a blue glare, and Tindómion frowned, one hand lifted in a silent demand for peace. There were undercurrents between them that Elrohir did not then understand. Later, he knew it for the interlocking webs of their histories, and — always — lust. How not? Each one was magnificent, each one trailed legends. As he grew older, he saw how they restrained themselves, how the cost was paid in flashing arguments and downright avoidance. And somehow they lived and worked together. What else could they do? Elrohir too, had joined their ranks.

In Dol Guldur Elrohir remembered. _More dangerous, less wise._ Less wise indeed. Dangerously foolish, and lax in their security, to allow Elgalad into their kingdom with such a secret tucked in his soul.

“They will come,” Elgalad said. “I h-have told them not to, but I fear they will. I w-would.”

“Told them? You can speak into one another's minds?” He had always assumed that this was something only the Aman-born Elves could essay, though he and his brother had communicate thus since childhood.

“Only with those I am close t-to. And to Vanimórë, of course.”

“You truly love him,” Elrohir marvelled, with the taste of gall on his tongue. Then, violently: “You are a fool, and blind. He is a craven who lacks the courage to die!”

Elgalad moved in a blur of silver. His eyes had changed. They were filled with light and rage, and met Elrohir's on a level.  
“And wouldst _th-thou_ have the courage to live his l-life?” he demanded. “He has _nothing._ And he believes if he d-dies he will be cast into th-the Void, where M-Morgoth would rape his soul for eternity. Thou hast seen the Void.” He was so close Elrohir could see the flaunting dark lashes, so thick it seemed a dark line was drawn about his eyes.

“That is their fate,” Elrohir said, hot and cold at once, hands clenched into fists. “the minions of the Dark.”

“If that is h-his fate, then it is mine too. And I would go with him gladly.”

“You are _mad_!”

“Then,” Elgalad smiled with such sweet voluptuousness Elrohir felt it in gut and groin. “It is a beautiful madness.”

Love. The bright love for the dark. How was it possible? Vanimórë was not some fabled hero like Tuor whom had bided his time in thrall to the Easterlings, then slain his guards and escaped to make war on them. When Elrohir had first seen Vanimórë ride out of the mists of Dol Guldur, his impression had been of a warrior prince, not a slave. No slave would have such freedom, would rise to command all Sauron's armies. Glorfindel had said there was a sorcerous binding at work, but Elrohir could not believe it. Nothing, he thought, could hold Vanimórë if he wished to be free.

Laughter breathed through his mind.

Elgalad was staring at him, still half-smiling his declaration of love. Elrohir turned away with a curse, paced the chamber, which would not have shamed Imladris. There were exotic touches that were alien, dark, rich colours, but nothing suggested that it belonged to the Dark Lord.

Laughter. The arras rippled. He smelled _heat_ , spices, and his nerves screamed as the door opened. A guard held it as Sauron entered. The lamps hissed.

“So unfortunate when those who count themselves allies cannot find common ground,” His suave voice was sheathed in blades. Elrohir's muscles tensed on reflex. He was at the heart of the power, beyond the terrifying cold of the Nazgûl, the brutal orcs, the twisted servants, the Men who called Sauron their Overlord. There was a stillness to the center, as if it could not be measured, and so all fell silent. He wanted to kill, to banish Sauron's spirit, and Aicanáro hummed deep in his blood.

 _Elladan._ He unwrapped the image of his brother's face turned to look back at him as he walked out of Dol Guldur. _Elladan, would it be worth it, if I could slay him? Whatever happened to me, to us, would it not be worth it?_  
Why was he even hesitating?

That light laughter again. Flames searing his mind. Cat's eyes rimmed with fire.  
“You cannot.” A voice within his mind and without, a voice that pushed against the chamber walls, too great to be contained by mere stone. Elrohir saw beyond the fire something glorious, profoundly ambiguous: power. He saw Sauron unveiled, coming down onto Arda, wings of white gold light or fire uplifted in the rush of his descent. And he was beautiful beyond words in any language save perhaps his native one. The man who sat in Dol Guldur, who stood before him now, was an echo of that splendour, cloaking it to move on a world not his own. Elrohir felt his knees bend toward obeisance, and wept an oath. He thought of his mother, destroyed, but Sauron's image overcame it; he had not raped and tortured Celebrian. He groped for another face, found Tindómion's, wearing grief like a perpetual veil, thought of Sauron crushing the dying Gil-galad, and then, falling through Tindómion's eyes into their shared heritage, he saw a man standing in a great doorway. His eyes were impossible, outshining the stars, and the fierce, terrible beauty of him eclipsed all else. He faced another being whom had tailored his form to co-exist with Eru's creation, and the might in him gnawed at Elrohir's very marrow. But Fëanor gleamed under his shadow, and his carved lips opened in words that carried not the faintest taint of fear.  
 _Get thee gone from my gate, thou jail-crow of Námo!_  
The door slammed shut with a ringing _boom_. Elrohir opened his eyes, bore the hammer of Sauron's scrutiny.

“Interesting,” Sauron allowed, inscrutable. “You cannot harm me. I have existed since before Time, and will exist when Time is no more.”

Elrohir's palm was wet where it grasped Aicanáro's hilt.  
“If the Void,” he said, through his teeth, “Can be accounted _existence._ ”

The fire roared up in Sauron's eyes, hungry, vengeful. It washed against Elrohir, who set his jaw against its touch. Perspiration sheeted his face. The sword's hilt scalded his flesh and with a choked cry of rage and pain, he released it. The black blade ran red as a furnace, crisping the rugs. Sauron made a casual gesture, and the heat died leaving only the stench or scorched wool.

“There is much,” Sauron said smiling that smile, “That you do not know. You will learn.” He turned away. Elrohir wrung his hand, swallowing curses, as Sauron stared at Elgalad, who shone like living silver.

“And you. I wonder. This one,” he gestured back at Elrohir. “Already has one foot in the Dark, as he would see it. But you.” He cupped Elgalad's chin in his hand. “Are his opposite. Child of Light, Son of Love. _His_ opposite too. Such extraordinary love. He named thee well.”

Elgalad's slim throat spasmed. His eyes glowed with reflections of flame. Elrohir, unthinking, moved toward him, not knowing what he could do to help, but _Eru! There must be something!_

“I would drink every cup of his t-tears,” Elgalad whispered. “Thou may own h-him, but thou dost not own my l-love for him, nor canst thou destroy it. For it is as eternal as th-thee. ”

“Destroy it?” Sauron murmured. “I think _he_ will destroy it one day, lovely one. And I...I can make thee forget.”

~~~

  



	9. ~ The Memories of Night ~

~ A strange, revelatory night.  
  
Ten men had come with Vanimórë to escort him. All wore veils. The twisted forest seemed all-but free of the noxious vapours of Elladan's previous journey, but the air smelled dank; pockets of mist collected in wet hollows. Stagnant pools winked lascivious black eyes.  
  
They halted as the dark came down on a small crusty hill, lit a fire from the fagots of wood the soldiers carried. Vanimórë made a gesture to his men. They removed their veils, settled to eat and drink.  
Elladan had seated himself a little away from the others. He could have run; there were no bonds upon him, but such an action would be foolish. He could scarcely remember how he and Elrohir had come to Dol Guldur. It would be too easy to become lost.  
  
He ate the dried meat and fruit without tasting, his mind reaching back to his brother's soul.  
 _Wait,_ he said. _I will come back. Only wait._  
  
He had been unable to extract any promises from Elrohir. His brother's self-loathing entangled with his hatred of Sauron, wildfire fanned by violent winds. Elladan knew how the last defiant gesture of his will and freedom beckoned; the knife slicing his throat. Elrohir would take his own life with a smile of ice, mocking, hating. Unable to kill Sauron, his desire for destruction turned inward. That insatiable maw did not care what it fed upon, always and forever hungry. He could slaughter as many orcs as he wished and never sate its appetite. All through that day Elladan wrestled with his twin's spirit until sweat broke in pinpricks over his body.  
  
Elrohir had always been more fierce in mood than he but until he walked from that reeking orc-den with the wreck of their mother in his arms, he had controlled it. After, his temper boiled over, scalding. He fed his desire for revenge with atrocities upon the orcs, making their deaths lingering agony. Elladan never rebuked him; indeed his own hands were not clean. He recognised the acts as barbaric, but saw no wrong in them. To do so would be to insult their long-departed mother, make of her torment a small thing, undeserving of remembrance. Thus there was no guilt.  
  
These excesses were known in Imladris, and largely ignored. Once, when Elladan wondered at his twin's cruelty, (and, secretly, his own) whether it was entirely Elvish or devolved from his Mortal blood, Erestor had laughed, those wolf's eyes of his glowing like the embers of a fire that might dim with sorrow and the passing of Time, but would never burn out.  
“If you had lived through the First Age,” he had said. “You would not even voice the question. Men tell tales of us. Who are those Elves they speak of, all-wise, white with piety? We left the Vanyar in Valinor.” His heavy lashes quenched the backward glance he gave to a history more brutal, more tragic than Elladan could know.  
  
Then came the wars against Angmar. Elladan saw, and understood. So few there were now whom had trodden the path of the Doom, so pitifully few. But _Eru_ they were transcendent, stars flaming brighter and brighter against the aging of the world, the fading of the Elves. He and Elrohir had longed to burn as one of them. And they did, but it was a fire fed with bitter, black thorns.  
  
He massaged his brother's soul as he had, many times, worked away the stony knots of tension in his shoulders.  
 _Wait. I will come for you._  
  
Through the veil of Elrohir's face, he watched the fire, the men seated around it. They were playing knuckle-bones, sipping wine. Just one cup apiece, Vanimórë had said, enough to ease their nerves. Men were superstitious, Elladan knew, and to them, the forest would be haunted. He noted that Vanimórë had set no watch; he himself patrolled. His skein of movement, of protection shone like a bright web about the knoll.  
  
There had been a hot, uncomfortable moment when he faced Vanimórë that morning, this enigmatic man he had seen brutally raped. He wanted to say, “I am sorry,” for being unable to help him. But there seemed no memory of the defilement in Vanimórë's mien. He walked with silken grace. He was courteous. It was so impossible Elladan did not know what to do with his emotions. He had wept at the rape, and a link in the mail of his sanity had broken. He was not mad (he thought), and neither was Elrohir, but few could know that they preserved their sanity as a man maintains his armour. Elrohir cared little for the loose links and rivets, so Elladan was forced to look for them, repair them on his twin's behalf. This vein of madness was the legacy of their mother's torment, but Vanimórë, victim of rape looked like the sanest man alive. Pride, it must be, and an absolute rejection of pity. Yes, pity would be as etching acid on his flesh. How could one understand him? Yet Elrohir should at least try and, predictably, he did not want to. Pride, again.  
  
The fire spat and crackled, and the soldiers sat close to its comfort as the night deepened, murmuring in their own alien tongue. Vanimórë came to Elladan, handed him a wine-cup. He took it, drank. Out in the forest, pale as falling moonlight, ghosts walked.  
  
“The houseless,” Vanimórë said in his wine-flavoured accent.  
  
They were gossamer drifts of hair, lithe bodies, the glint of long-dead eyes, the curve of a blade, a bow's arch.  
  
“There are two kinds,” Vanimórë continued. “These, I call the warders. They died before Sauron claimed Dol Guldur, or at least not under his power. They are drawn to Life, but do not seek to possess.”  
  
“I have heard of this.” Elladan said quietly, glad to be offered the chance at conversation, and feeling his way with caution. The subject was somber, but no topic here could be less. “The Silvans do not heed the call to the Halls of Waiting.”  
  
Vanimórë bent his head. “So I have heard, and Elgalad confirmed it. Then there are the others, whose souls were trapped, who do seek to possess the living. These warders array themselves against them, perhaps people they knew, even loved. They yearn to live again, but do not succumb. I have not often seen so many. Thy soul is a lamp. It beckons them.”  
  
Elladan pressed a hand to his breast, where a blue-white jewel seemed to have lodged itself like a gem into a setting. He felt the yearning in the dead, their defiance and courage still bound to the land they loved. They had turned aside from rebirth in the West, doomed themselves for eternity until perhaps, even the memories they held faded, sank back into the earth.  
  
“To embrace such a fate,” he said.  
  
“Had they chosen otherwise, they would be imprisoned in the Void. From what Elgalad has said they care naught for the Laws the Valar laid down, and why should they?” Vanimórë's voice slid from its mellifluous sheath, emerged as one of his blades. “Tell me: In the hall, why didst thou step forward into the door of Night?”  
  
He had not expected that question, though he had thought on it. He stiffened against the memory of howling darkness, a mountain-fall of vengeance.  
“I do not know.” That was the truth. He had been impelled; it had seemed the only thing to do. “But I know now that others are there. It was no lie.”  
  
“Thou didst think it lies?” Vanimórë's brows lifted. “Glorfindel and Tindómion heard Gil-galad's doom pronounced. As did I.”  
  
Elladan shook his head. “I did not think they lied; I hoped they were mistaken. What, then, are we fighting for?” he demanded.  
  
“For love.” Vanimórë's eyes glowed like flowers at dusk. “In the end, that is what we all fight for, even if only love of one's own skin.”  
  
“Glorfindel trusted you,” Elladan said slowly. “You fought for the Alliance at the end.”  
  
“No. He did not trust me.” A little, curling smile. “How could he, when Sauron can see into my mind? Perhaps he respected me a little.”  
  
 _More than a little, I think._  
“And what do _you_ fight for? Commander-in-chief of his forces, and he uses you like a slave.”  
  
“I _am_ his slave.”  
  
“You hate him as much as we do.”  
  
“And still I cannot help thee.” Vanimórë raised his hand, long, slender fingers half sheathed in leather. “Even were Elgalad not his prisoner. I have no influence with Sauron. And I do not hate him for the same reasons the Elves do. My reasons are personal.”  
  
“Elgalad. ” Elladan watched his face, saw the shutters close fast at the name, heard the passion Vanimórë concealed emerge in his voice as he said, “For Elgalad, I would cut out thine heart and eat it if Sauron so commanded.”  
  
There was no doubt in Elladan's mind that he meant it.  
  
“And thou wouldst do the same for thy brother.” Vanimórë made it sound perfectly reasonable. After a pulse of silence, Elladan said hoarsely, “Yes.”  
  
“In the end, it comes to this: what will a person do for those they love? And the answer is: Anything.” There was a faint crease between Vanimórë's brows, and Elladan knew that despite his words Vanimórë would try to aid Elrohir. It was not in him to look away.  
  
“He calls you coward. I know you are not.” But he also understood, because he felt it himself, his brother's helpless rage at Vanimórë's resilience.  
  
  
  
“Perhaps I am.” Vanimórë lifted wide shoulders.  
  
Confounded, Elladan came to his feet. He wanted to go now, find his horse and ride to Lothlórien. _Father. Grandam._ He had been calling to them since they left Dol Guldur, could feel them searching for his mind as one that gropes to find a door behind heavy canvas. Sauron's power still lay too heavy here. The poisonous mists were the least of it.  
  
“Be patient,” Vanimórë counseled. “They will already know, and will be moving.”  
  
Elladan flicked him a look. “Yes.” If their father could not reach their minds, likewise Galadriel, and if the Galadhrim reported they had gone into the forest, an alarm would have been raised. It felt like an Age had gone by since they left the bright meads, plunged into the fetid decay of these woods.  
  
But every moment was vital. he did not trust his brother not to provoke Sauron, would not have trusted himself. He thought of the battle in the hall, how the Dark Lord had taken the flames from the fire-bowls and laid them down as a barrier. So close to him, and they were rendered ineffectual. A shameful knowledge.  
  
“We should have fought through that fire.” He spoke almost to himself.  
  
“Sauron has played with the fires of Orodruin,” Vanimórë said. “He could have melted the flesh from thy bones. And even had he not, thinks't thou he is so easy to kill? Númenor took him beneath the waves of Belegaer, and he returned. The One Ring was cut from his hand, and that did not destroy him.”  
  
“Then what can?”  
  
“The destruction of the One Ring, perhaps. Even then, I am unsure. I do not think one of the Ainur can be utterly annihilated.”  
  
“The One Ring passed out of knowledge long ago.” Elladan gazed into the wine, black in the dusk. Elrohir's face looked back at him, all angry beauty.  
 _Wait for us._ He swallowed fear like ice. It spread into his gut, through his muscles. The cold of deepest winter. His breath came like smoke. Elrohir's eyes burned incandescent with dark, desperate rage, and Elladan reached toward him, loving, hating...The chiaroscuro of emotions, their abyssal depth, shocked him. He pulled away from their mesh, and discovered himself again. Those feelings were not his, but were so close to his own they intertwined like vines. Elrohir's features shifted, a barely perceptible movement of bone and flesh. Not his brother, but Elladan knew him, a sidelong pull in his blood.  
He dropped the cup. The vision drained away with the spilled wine. The cold faded.  
  
“What is it?” Vanimórë gestured, and a soldier came with the wineskin, filled the cup again. Elladan drank, battling with confusion and awe like a slap from a mailed hand.  
  
“Let us walk around the knoll.” Vanimórë tilted his head toward the men. “I will ask none to keep watch, not here, but it helps them to know I do.”  
  
“And you do not fear.” Elladan walked by his side. Vanimórë was as silent as any Elf hunter. No twig broke under his feet. Elladan understood why this man's presence would comfort his men. When he was young, first out in the wilds, he had often curled under a bedroll glad of Glorfindel or Tindómion awake watching over the camp. He had believed that no danger could come nigh while they warded the night.  
  
“Neither dost thou.”  
  
“The dead...” Elladan groped back for the image of the familiar face. He plucked at the memories like harp-strings. A voice in the Void: _“Thou may not have them.”_ A fire born in the stars surrounded he and Elrohir both.  
  
Waking, shackled to a cross, he had not remembered. Now he did, and could not breathe.  
 _Did they save us?_  
 _Did something of them come with us?_  
  
He found air, forced it into lungs cramped by disbelief. If he voiced his speculations, it would be known to Sauron, but perhaps there was no harm in it. Let him wonder what might have slipped from the Everlasting Dark.  
  
“In the hall,” he said. “Were you also drawn into the Dark? What did you see?”  
  
“Melkor.”  
  
The name prickled through Elladan. His nerves hissed with hatred.  
“Naught else?”  
  
“Lights. I heard voices.”  
  
“I saw the dead.” He drove his conviction into Vanimórë's strict, patient face. “I have never seen them before, but I knew them. Fëanor, his sons, Fingolfin, Fingon, Gil-galad.” Impossible that he should have seen anything. Nothing should have form in the Void. He needed to speak with Glorfindel. “Fëanor looks much like my brother, and I — I never knew they were so alike. Not twins but very near.”  
  
“Ah.” With a tilting smile, and a thread in his voice that might have been longing. “Thou hast Finwëion blood. It is not surprising they would be drawn to thee.”  
  
“They should not _be there._ ” Fury seared his body.  
  
“No, and yet they are unconquered.”  
  
Yes. Through all these Ages. And it did not negate the horror of such a sentence.  
“I feel Fingolfin's memories in me.” He pressed a hand against that star in his soul. “Could they...?”  
  
Vanimórë looked hard at him. “What feelest thou?”  
  
Love. Hate. _Passion._ And madness. A great fortress with blue and silver banners snapping against dark mountains. “I feel — ” His teeth snapped shut. Snatches of quiet conversation in Imladris, not meant to be overheard. Tindómion, Glorfindel, Erestor. Knowledge carried in the blood.  
 _Are you with me?_ he wondered through the anger, the sense of a terrible wrong.  
  
“I know little of the Void.” Vanimórë sounded thoughtful. “Save what Sauron has told me.” It was odd how his naming of the Dark Lord somehow grounded him in familiarity. He was not, and never would be again, a dread, nameless legend, wolf, bat, Morgoth's mightiest servant. Elladan's mind was forced to reconstruct his beliefs. Power, amorality could inhabit a fair human body, and be more alarming for it. The Elves of Ost-in-Edhil must have felt the same when Annatar, Lord of Gifts, unveiled his true self and laid Eregion waste.  
  
“He does not believe it to be _nothing._ Therefore the name Void is a misnomer.” Dusk had yielded to night proper, and the little fire on the hill was a beacon as they walked. The drifting shades were more visible, at times looking almost solid, but they came no closer.  
“If it were nothing, then souls could not survive there. A soul is not nothing; it is energy. The Void is not this reality, that of physical things.”  
  
“But it is used as as a prison.” One that could be broken into — and out of? Elladan quickened his pace.  
  
“Perhaps not forever. One can hope.”  
  
“What, then, keeps them from this world?”  
  
“The Void has its own laws, the same laws that determine when we drop something, it does not fall up. That is too simplistic, but these are deep matters.”  
  
One did not speak of the Everlasting Dark in Imladris. It touched them too near.  
  
“The Valar must have slain Melkor's body, and the forms of all they found in the ruins of Angband,” Vanimórë said. “Either that, or physical flesh was destroyed when they were sent there. I was reliably informed that long before he rebelled against the Valar, Melkor walked the void, but as spirit alone.”  
  
“They say,” Elladan said, his mind coursing like a hunting hound's. “That Morgoth was thrust through the door of Night, that a guard is forever set upon the walls, and that Eärendil keeps watch upon the ramparts of the sky.”  
Songs of Eärendil were sung in his father's halls. How often had he gazed upon the Evening Star and thought of his grandsire at the helm of Vingilot?  
  
They had traversed half the knoll. It was quite dark now, but there was still a gleam to Vanimórë's face.  
  
“They say.” A laugh was hidden in the words. “Well, it makes a good tale.”  
  
“What do you believe?” With a spark of anger.  
  
“Sauron too is Ainu,” Vanimórë murmured, and the quietness of his tone gave the words greater emphasis. “He came from outside Time with all his kind. Therefore when he speaks I am inclined to believe him. In the Hall, Melkor tried to possess him. Such things have happened before. I have travelled far into the East and South where there are shamen and mages who call upon spirits. Some, I think, look too far into the Dark. The Void is all around us, Elladan. There is no one entrance, no door of Night. If those whom inhabit the Void are invited into this world, they can come through because, by using another's body, they can exist here again. It is not so different to the Houseless.” Vanimórë turned his head to look at the ghostly shapes. “It is, I think natural for them to remain here, on this Earth, and wholly unnatural for them to be sent into Night. One day, Melkor will find one strong enough to house him, at least for a time, and he will come again, with all his legions. Sauron believes that, and so do I. But if Melkor and his servants can leave the Void, perhaps others can also — if one is willing to invite them in, and lose their own soul thereby.”  
  
Elladan searched his face in silence.  
  
“I am not possessed.”  
  
“No.” Vanimórë paused, stared into his eyes. “Perhaps it is more like the smoke of incense lingering on one's clothes and hair. Fëanor's and Fingolfins souls.”  
  
Fingolfin was rarely mentioned in Imladris. The tragic grandeur of his death had imposed silence, and too much controversy surrounded Fëanor for him to ever be a topic of conversation. Everything lead back to him, or proceeded from him. Of those living only Erestor and Glorfindel had seen him. Tindómion dreamed his father's dreams and saw his grandsire as Maglor had, though he was disinclined to share what he saw. For the _peredhil_ the complication lay in their Maia blood through Lúthien. Two sons of Fëanor had abducted her, and tried to kill Beren. Later the sons had attacked and brought down Doriath. It was fairly clear whose names were revered in Imladris, and the Fëanorions were not among them. The books of lore in the library called him kinslayer, madman, evil. Only when he was grown did Elladan learn that not every-one agreed with that assessment. For the sake of amity, the two factions nursed their opinions privately. But at whiles, when Erestor or Tindómion's chambers showed lamplight through the night, one might make their way silently to the balcony, listen to words that shocked and thrilled. After, he and Elrohir would return to their own rooms and murmur in the dark.  
  
Elladan needed to speak to Glorfindel, the only Elf ever to die and return to Middle-earth. Glorfindel knew the fate of the damned dead, but perhaps not that they existed, unbroken. He could do nothing about it, no-one could save the Valar, but it was imperative it be known. He cursed under his breath at the delay.  
  
“We will reach the borders tomorrow,” Vanimórë said. “ Believe me, I understand. Elgalad waits in Dol Guldur, and I would as lief be there, but I will not tire my men by having them march through the night.”  
  
Black shapes moved across the hillock as soldiers settled into their bedrolls.  
Elladan said, “You care for them.”  
  
“They are my responsibility.”  
  
“Is that all? I think not.” He spread his fingers, trying to hold incomprehension. “You are a man who _cares._. A man of honour. That is what Glorfindel saw in you.”  
  
“There are many men of honour among those who serve Sauron,” Vanimórë said, his voice indifferent.  
  
 _But none like you. You have made me acknowledge that my brother is well suited to be a warrior of the Dark. We are supposed to serve the_ Light.  
If there was any such thing. He could not serve any power that would condemn the souls of Elves to the same prison as Morgoth.  
  
Elrohir had perhaps come to that judgement earlier than he, emanating contempt when prayers and praises were offered to the Valar. Before any meal or feast, their father stood and faced west, intoning a short invocation of gratitude, at which Elrohir's eyes would harden like frost. Even before their mother's departure he had ceased to pray either to Eru or the Valar, tossing away the childhood custom as though it were an outworn pair of breeches. Now the twins only joined their father the most formal of gatherings, and Elladan did not think the relief ran only one way.  
“Do you ever,” he asked carefully. “Pray. To any power?”  
  
“Once. I was little more than a child. It becomes hard, does it not, when there is no answer?” Vanimórë's voice twisted into cynicism. “Now, I simply hold to hope.”  
  
Elladan saw, with brutal clarity, Vanimórë's hands gripping the chains, his body slammed into the wall as the uruks raped him. His stomach lurched, sickened.  
“For what?”  
  
“For something...better?” Vanimórë laughed, the sound rich and dry, shocking in this place. The ghostly shapes seemed to pause, looking at him. “Sauron told thy brother that serving him is not so terrible as thou wouldst think. He did not lie. I have seen far places, great cities, deserts, the steppes of the East where one can see so far the horizon curves, the palaces and gardens of Cathaia. These things, I cherish, for they are _better._ ”  
  
“And Mordor.”  
  
“Yes, and Mordor.”  
  
“Tell me this. Do you believe he will kill my brother?”  
  
“He wishes to use Elrohir against the Elves. The idea amuses him.”  
  
“That does not answer my question.”  
  
“Because I cannot. It very much depends on Elrohir.” He paused. “The Men of the East are skilled horse-breeders. Even a vicious stallion can be put to mares. But if they prove too dangerous then they are killed.”  
  
It was an apt analogy.  
  
“Just hold him,” Vanimórë said. “To life. To hope. I know thou and he can communicate in ways even Sauron cannot see. So does he, but he cannot prevent it or know what thou sayest.”  
  
“Now, how can you know that?”  
  
“I have known other twins.”  
  
 _Elrohir._ With pain and twisting terror. _I ask you, tell you, beg you to hold for me. For us._  
  
He locked with Elrohir's mind through the night. He showed his twin his vision, his conversation with Vanimórë, his conclusion that both he and Elrohir had been touched by the souls of Fëanor and Fingolfin. If he, Elladan, felt Fingolfin's memories and emotions, had Elrohir absorbed Fëanor's? In response came his brother's dreams as they were poisoned by the mists, his remembrance of the Void. Elladan felt him pacing out the night until dawn came grey through the murk of the dying forest and the men stirred. When one brought him food, flat bread, meat, dried fruit, he nodded his thanks. Vanimórë crossed to him. Elladan had watched him even as he wrestled with and embraced his twin. Elrohir had told him of his conversation with Elgalad. _Eru, he thinks he will be cast into the Everlasting Dark if he dies. Morgoth's plaything._  
Little wonder, then, that he would not allow rape to break him.  
  
 _I trust him,_ he told Elrohir. _Insofar as it is wise to. But for Elgalad he will do anything._  
  
Vanimórë handed him hot wine sweetened with honey.  
  
 _I know, and the fool would have done anything for him._  
  
Quick as a whip, Elladan caught the past tense. His muscles locked.  
  
 _Eru, is he_ dead?  
  
No, Elrohir replied, the tone of his mind taut and furious. Sauron had barely touched Elgalad, but when he was done, the wood-Elf remembered nothing of whom he had been.  
  
 _I tried to stop him. He said that he would order Vanimórë to take off both your hands, and send you out of the forest. Beren lost one hand — he smiled as he said it! — therefore perhaps his descendent should lose two._  
  
Elladan swallowed acid. Vanimórë would have done it.  
  
 _Is he hurt? What does he remember?_  
  
 _I am not certain. He seems to believe that he was captured to draw Thranduil out of his kingdom, which may be part of the truth. He knows he is of the forest. He is with me now. And he is...different._  
  
 _How?_  
  
 _His stammer is gone, for one thing, but it seems to me..._ Elrohir paused. _He seemed so innocent, so vulnerable. He loved Vanimórë, and had no armour against it. Now, that is gone._  
  
 _I must tell him._ Elladan came to his feet.  
  
Vanimórë listened, expressionless, and said, “He only needs Elgalad there to control me.” His voice was steady as granite; his face might have been chiselled from it. “If he were free, I would even thank Sauron for this. It is better that I am forgotten.”  
  
A pure, blue-white fury burned away Elladan's preoccupations with his twin, with the souls in the Void, allowing him to truly _see_ Vanimórë. Self-control, the attempt to dignify his life, not to fall, not to break, had molded him into this shining hardness, but behind his eyes the wrath of dragons raged. And loneliness so deep Elladan knew it ran back into this man's past like chains. For a moment, he glimpsed a youth, all disheveled black hair and long, shaking limbs sitting in a dank gut of stone. It was so similar to the vision Sauron had showed he and Elrohir that he knew it was no mere thought but had been drawn from memory. Vanimórë had endured it.  
  
“Elves do not forget.” He struggled with overwhelming sympathy. “Not even Sauron can take away our memories. Not forever.”  
  
“Tragic, is it not?” Vanimórë turned away. In his wake rolled a wave of emotion, wings of dark despair.  
  


~~~


	10. ~ Out of the Shadows ~

~ He was dreaming when it came. The Ainur could dream, though they had more control over the subconscious mind than Mortals. There were times and places Sauron did not wish to return to, thus he did not, though at whiles a wrench of power from the deep past or outside Time rendered him helpless until he could gather himself and fight free. But this vision came like a shower presaging a storm, and was familiar to him.  
  
He walked in a sun-leavened garden, grassy swards fractured by flower beds and fruit trees. Banks of lavender drew lazy bees to its fragrance. Summer showed a benign face to Ost-in-Edhil. The one who strolled with him moved expressive hands as he talked. Sunlight burned on the only ring to adorn those slim fingers: a great sapphire set in a carved nest of white gold.  
  
Celebrimbor was not speaking of the art they shared, not today. Such could consume them easily enough, but this was less lofty, the simpler bitter-sweet threads that stitch day to day. Always there was more bitterness for Celebrimbor; the past threw a shadow he could never outpace, and perhaps did not want to. Memories could reveal themselves in a sudden tightness of his mouth, a look in his eyes, a stiffness locking the straight shoulders, but if he shared them, it was not with Sauron.  
Through the dream, he was conscious (again) of the waste of brilliance, even rare friendship.  
  
The tranquil image bled fierily into Celebrimbor's body impaled on a shaft, a gory banner at the head of Sauron's forces, the light gone from eyes that had once blazed like winter stars.  
Celebrimbor had not died of the impalement, though the Noldor might have believed it, thinking Sauron capable of any atrocity. As he was, but not this one. He had known it would be no easy task to break the knowledge he required out of Celebrimbor. The Fëanorions would die cursing before they broke. Melkor had tried with Maedhros. He had failed, and Sauron did not have years to work on Celebrimbor.  
  
A sense of injustice had driven him to torture his former friend, and the fact he was brought to that pass and impasse enraged him. He had sent Vanimórë to 'question' Celebrimbor knowing his son would kill the Fëanorion quickly, though he had not admitted it to himself when he gave the order. The mind worked strangely at times. After, he punished his son because there was a price for disobedience, and his authority could not be seen to be compromised. But he would be lying if he said there was no relief in that quick death.  
  
The sapphire-mounted ring spun, twisted into another, heavy gold, suited to a small, burly hand; one of the seven Dwarf Rings. The gold melted, whirled upward, tracing words in the air that solidified into one hot, bright circle. It hung for a moment in nothing, then dropped into blackness. Ripples raced outward, lapped at unknown shores.  
  
Deep within that fathomless pool where the One Ring lay lost, tides stirred, an eye opened. Tiny pebbles shifted, rolled, fell. Massed behind them was an avalanche.  
  
Sauron woke. He stepped to the ebbing fire, roused it with a thought, and flung his mind into the flames. Mountains ran down to dark forest, pines were burning through the black rush and fanged mouths of wargs. Light slid from polished blades, the wings of great eagles swept against a sunrise. And through the images, turning about them ran the words he had inscribed on the One Ring.  
  
He snapped straight, breath coming hard. For the first time in hundreds of years...not a barely perceptible touch now. It was moving. Who bore it? He ran his mind along the visions, explored each of them. The Hithaeglir, a flight, a battle, one Man, old, bearded, a group of smaller figures whose compact strength could only belong to Dwarves, an orc with colourless skin. Of course. Azog's long vendetta against the House of Durin.  
His thoughts sidestepped neatly to Thráin, son of the last King under the Mountain. Sauron had taken his Ring, and still held it. Dwarves had proved far less malleable than Men, and the Rings had not reduced them to shadow or obsessed them, rather they set a hunger in the bearer's mind for wealth, for gold...  
  
Sauron moved to a box of sandalwood and lifted the lid, picked up the heavy ring that nestled there. The gold grasped at the firelight, winked like a dragon's eye, and he considered Thrain, mad and dying in Dol Guldur's lightness pits, his lifelong dream gone to ashes in Erebor where a dragon had slept on a bed of gold for sixty years.  
  
Smaug. Perhaps the last of the great dragons. Sauron had once sent Vanimórë to the Withered Heath where they bred, and ever and anon issued forth in cold or in fire. His son had reported crumbling bones, and only two living creatures. Dragons had never been cooperative. They were useful weapons of terror, but Sauron had never favoured them. In long-gone days he had matched his will and wits with both Glaurung and Ancalagon, and they had bowed their heads to him. Smaug however, was of a newer Age. He had never bowed to any-one.  
  
He tapped the ring against his teeth, laid it back in the box, closed the lid. What was the connection between Dwarves, Smaug and the One? Moving to a chair he sat, sifted his thoughts: Celebrimbor, the last Dwarf ring, Dwarves in the Hithaeglir. Thrain's kin, or Azog would not be following. Going to the Iron Mountains? _Erebor?_ Unlikely. It would take an army of Dwarves out of the Elder Days to defeat Smaug, and the line of Durin was diminished. Thror was dead, Thrain too. There had been a grandson.  
  
He steepled fingers under his chin, tried to will down the storm of emotions that threatened to knot his guts. _Calm. Think._ He had known the One could not be lost forever, though it might lie for an Age at the roots of a mountain. Sooner or later it would draw the mind of any who came near: animal, orc, or human — or Dwarf? He needed to know more, but could not leave Dol Guldur until he had dealt with the White Council.  
  
The fire, eating at nothing, curled and stretched into a red-golden beast, spiralled into a circle. Dragon. Ring. Sauron reached out a hand, could almost feel the hot wrap of metal about his severed finger. His eyes narrowed. It was unwise to ignore foresight, howsoever it came, vision or dream or a ghost-brush of fingers on the mind. Smaug and the One were (or would be) connected. And Smaug was a winged fire-drake. Sauron remembered how dragon-fire had withered Ard Galen, thought of Elrond's haven, a valley he, Sauron, had been unable to take, the forest of Lothlórien, and the wood-Elves realm. The later at least would make perfect bonfires. He still hoped to use Elrohir to open negotiations between himself and the Elves, but if he could not...  
  


~~~

  
  
“I am sending you north.” Sauron waved his son toward the wine table. “Take a few men, send the rest to Mordor.”  
  
“Oh?” Vanimórë poured the wine steadily, proferred the carafe. Sauron nodded, took the goblet.  
“Erebor, perhaps.” He watched his son's face, the perfect control underlying suave bones.  
  
“There is a dragon,” Vanimórë said calmly. “In Erebor.”  
  
“Sleeping in gold-glutted dreams. Yes. Listen.”  
Vanimórë watched him quietly as he talked. The imperious black brows arched.  
“Thou art sure this is the voice of the One?” Then he gestured. “Of course thou art.” He put his wine-cup down. “I would advise thee to forget it.”  
  
Sauron asked mildly. “Would you?” And then curled his hand about the great braid of hair. “I thank-you for your advice.”  
  
Vanimórë looked at him. “Thou thinks't to control the Three, still? Is it even worth it? Thou hast said the Elves are failing, leaving.”  
  
“So they are, and it is their own fault entirely. Had they joined with me, they would not now be a dwindling people.” He tugged on the braid until the white column of Vanimórë's throat arched back. “No, perhaps it is not worth it for that alone.” But he would be damned before he allowed any-one else to claim the One. To feel other hands wielding it would be akin to violation, too close to _possession._  
  
He withdrew his hand.  
  
“Why Erebor?” his son asked. “Why art thou not sending me to the mountains, if the Ring may be there?”  
  
Vanimórë was the only person Sauron trusted with the One save the Nazgûl. There was nothing, when he explored his son's mind, even of interest in it, only irritation. Vanimórë would have thrown the Ring into the volcano, and Isildur with it; he had said so. (How fortunate he had not. Its destruction would drag Sauron out of the world. As long as Vanimórë lived, he could return, but it would be a hard path). But his son had never been interested in things of power, even that power which was native to him. It was walled off inside his mind, rejected as his father's blood. The only other half-blood Maia in the world had not hesitated to use it, and up to the time of her death had probably thought of it as her own, descended from divine race*. Sauron could have enlightened her. The force and command that had defeated him and brought down the walls of Tol-in-Gaurhoth was braced and augmented by other minds, ones he had known before Time. Lúthien alone could not have bested him, and that was not his ego talking, but inarguable fact. The Valar had a Silmaril in their sights, and had used what tools came to hand to get one. They were far more aware of what passed in Middle-earth than the Noldor believed, and Melkor had said that their desire for the Jewels of Fëanor was as great as his own. Melkor could lie, but Sauron had seen the Silmarils, and in this instance, believed him.  
He said now, “The White Council will come from the West, along with the warriors of Imladris. What if you were captured? And you would _ensure_ your own capture. You would tell them everything you know of me, my plans, of Mordor. Then, even if your _shame_ ” he bit on the word. “was too great for you to admit whose blood runs in your veins, there are some who would see it. Do you think that because you fought with the Alliance on that last day in Mordor, they will forgive you your heritage? Do you expect Glorfindel to support you? What do think he will feel when he discovers he tupped the son of Gorthaur? You know the tale of Finrod his beloved brother. Do not be a fool. They would send you in chains to Valinor, where you would either be slain and banished to the Void, or imprisoned in the Halls of Mandos. And they would never let you out.” He smiled flatly into his son's eyes. “I may be able to use Elrohir to forge a relationship with the Elves in time, but never _you_. Remember what you are. Now, tell me you understand, because I _know_ you only pretend to be obtuse.”  
  
Vanimórë spoke through his teeth: “I know what I am, _father._ I understand.”  
  
“Good. So. You will go north. Listen to the rumours in that town on the lake, Esgaroth. See if orcs move in the north. I want to know if Smaug stirs. Something is happening, and I cannot yet see it. But it leads to Erebor.”  
  
“And dragon-fire can destroy a Ring of Power, or so thou hast told me.” His son's tone was dulcet.  
  
“A theory.”  
  
“And what,” Vanimórë asked. “Of Elrohir and Elgalad?”  
  
“They will accompany you. No doubt Elgalad will try and escape. You will not let him.”  
  
His son did not question why Elgalad must remain a prisoner, why Sauron had stripped away his memories. It was a cruel act, and he expected no less from his father. He did not know it was all to an end. Every hammer blow, every bath of fire, of cold was another step in his fashioning. Will the sword break _this_ time? So far it had not. Sauron drew his fingers down the high, sweeping curve of cheekbone to the corner of the deeply scrolled mouth.  
“Is it not possible that once away from Dol Guldur, Elrohir will be able to communicate mind-to-mind with his father?”  
  
“He has bound himself to me, and I can prevent that, as I can prevent thee. And would he, even if he could? Broken oaths carry a harsh penalty.”  
  
“Indeed.”  
  
“Watch for Dwarves,” he said. “For anything unusual. Gather information and reach for me. This will be a good test for the _peredhel_. Can he work with you, can he take orders? And yes, will he hold to his vow? If not, I _will_ break him. I have no use for worthless weapons.” He flicked his fingers. “Very harsh penalties. I will ensure it.”  
  
  
Vanimórë stared at him. “I think he will hold to his vow. And not from fear. But what thou wilt get at the end, what he will become — ”  
  
“Some-one like you, I hope. At least as useful to me as you are, and perhaps more so. If not, I will have essayed it, and will still have you.”  
  
“The blood of the Finwii is in him, both sides of the blanket.” His unspoken words: _Be very careful._  
  
“Yes.” Sauron thought of Celebrimbor, of Maglor in Barad-dûr. “And that will make it even more satisfying if all falls out as I hope.” He watched his son's face closely, knowing the emotions trapped under it. Few people would have seen anything, but he knew Vanimórë intimately. He was grieving his loss: Elgalad.  
 _You will survive. That is what we do._  
Sauron had thought that Elgalad might be simple-minded, that something in the complex workings of his brain had failed or broken, but now, holding his memories, able to delve into them, he knew that was not so. The foundation was, of course, that he had been raised by Vanimórë whom, longing for a child he could never engender, had loved him unstintingly. Yet Elgalad had never looked upon him as a father, and it was not surprising that when the first stirrings of desire woke in him, his love should take on a different flavour. But there was more. Elgalad looked clear past the facade Vanimórë had built to face his world, and into the soul. He saw, perhaps without fully understanding, the pain and self-loathing, the unlit chasms of anguish, and poured his love into them. There was nothing weak, either, in that love, Sauron admitted. It was powerful, it was everything his son craved, and it could not be permitted to weaken him.  
  
“Do I have thine authority to treat with the dragon?” Vanimórë asked.  
  
“I have not yet decided.” He tipped Elgalad from his mind. “Wait for my orders, and if I send you into Erebor, try not to get blasted into smouldering char.”  
  
Vanimórë bent his head, turned. “I will try.”  
  
Sauron let him reach the door before saying, “Do you think you could kill a dragon?”  
  
He halted, did not look round, his back lance-straight. “Others have before me. Why not?”  
  
Laughing at his sangfroid, Sauron said, “Go.” It might yet come to that.  
  


~~~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * quoted from the Silmarillion.


	11. ~ Demons of Fear ~

~ “Wilt thou keep thine oath?” Elgalad asked. He let himself down from the barred windows, the muscles of his arm moving sleek as a cat's. It was surprising, Elrohir thought, how much became obvious that before, Elgalad's love had disguised. Love was the greatest weakness, but how could he, Elrohir, reject it when he was bound to Sauron by his own love for Elladan. But Elladan was his brother, more, his twin. Love between them was the natural order of things.  
  
“I have sworn,” he said, flesh icy. “Oaths are not so lightly broken among my people. Do you wood-Elves then break your own so easily?”  
  
The lucent eyes searched his. “No,” Elgalad said simply. “And neither do we speak them lightly. But for all thy hatred, son of Elrond, and all thy grief, thou art not fitted to serve the dark. It will destroy thee.”  
  
Elrohir laughed, dry and harsh. It died in his throat. Elgalad might not remember anything of their past interactions, but he still saw clearly.  
“ _He_ seems to believe that I am well suited.”  
  
“From all I have ever heard, he always desired the _Golodhrim_ to serve him.” Elgalad went to a side table. Their meal had been taken away by the same two young guards Elrohir had seen on the morning of Elladan's departure. The day lagged, rain tapped listlessly against the window. A coal fire bloomed in the hearth, lanterns hung from brackets but the shadows collected like miasma in the room.  
  
“Oaths,” Elgalad murmured, filling two silver goblets with wine. Chunks of polished amethyst studded the cups. “I do not believe an oath made under duress need be kept.” He held out the wine. “But no doubt Sauron is prepared for that.”  
  
“I do not think it matters, and as long as my brother is safe, I care little.” Elrohir drank. _You desire punishment,_ Sauron had said. There was truth in that, and no-one in Imladris who would punish him as he deserved.  
  
“But thou must care.” Elgalad came forward, lifted a hand to Elrohir's face. He did not move as the long fingers cupped his cheek. “Son of Thunder.” His mouth shaped the words like a blessing.  
  
Elrohir's fingers clamped down on his wrist, shoved his hand away. Elgalad's brows rose. His lips curved, then a sound brought his head up.  
“Listen.” He returned to the window, pulled himself up. From here, one could look down into the forest, the road that slashed south away from Dol Guldur. Elrohir joined Elgalad, saw, through the streaming rain, soldiers, caped against the weather, marching toward the gatehouse. He had known when Elladan was released from the forest, unharmed. He would have sunk to his knees in relief had he been alone. It truly did not matter now what happened to him. Save that suicide was a waste, and the ember burning in his soul would not embrace it.  
  
Fëanor. It had taken him some time to remember his visions in the forest, in the Void. Such things were so far beyond comprehension that the mind dealt with them by forcing them into the roots and hollows of hazy memory, like childhood dreams. But if Elrohir concentrated, he could bring everything back. It was not, he agreed with his brother during their long night of communion, a possession. But it was there. Fëanor, his name a curse, a sorrow, (and still loved) had reached out from the Everlasting Dark and touched him. Fëanor's was not a soul prone either to self-pity or self-loathing; he felt it reproach him.  
  
“This is the one you spoke of,” Elgalad said, and Elrohir frowned. “Sauron's commander and slave.”  
  
There was nothing of memory in his voice or face. Elrohir, who had been angered by Elgalad's love for Vanimórë was now illogically furious that Sauron had torn it away. It was better for Elgalad, though it had not been done with altruism but (as far as Elrohir could see) to hurt Vanimórë. Sauron had said, _Elgalad has just woken from the effects of the mists_ , and so he seemed to believe.  
  
He said, “He cannot help. He too, is bound.”  
  
Elgalad looked at him in surprise. “I would not expect help from a servant of the Dark Lord. Wouldst thou?”  
  
 _Yes,_ Elladan had whispered.  
  
“Of course not,” Elrohir replied.  
  


~~~

Vanimórë did not come until the long day faded into dusk. When the door opened, Elrohir stiffened, crossed his arms, and faced it.

Vanimórë had bathed, his hair damp, and drawn back into a long stallion's tail. He smelled of soap, sandalwood, and leather. He inclined his head in greeting.  
“Thy brother is safely away, as I am sure thou knowest,” he said formally. “I tarried long enough to see that there were Elves waiting beyond the borders, and that he went to meet with them.”

“Galadhrim,” Elrohir responded and, stiffly: “You have my thanks.”

“It was my pleasure. Now thou must look to thyself.” His eyes moved to Elgalad. “The both of thee.”

Elgalad's brows crooked faintly, as if puzzled. Elrohir remembered his own first sight of Vanimórë, and wondered if the impact of his presence would reach through the Dark Lord's spell. It seemed not, though it was clear Vanimórë was not what Elgalad had expected. He was not what any-one would expect.

“Tomorrow,” Vanimórë added, when neither responded. “We leave.”

“ _Leave_?” Elrohir said sharply. “For where?” Fear rose cold in his throat. Dol Guldur set the mildew of old curses in his bones, but there were worse places.

“We head north,” Vanimórë said, surprising him. “South into Rhovannion first, and then we follow the border of the forest back north. Thou may look upon this as thy first exercise. Sauron,” he added. “Remains here for the time being.” Glancing at Elgalad, he said, “It does not concern thy people. This is another matter. He wishes a report.”

Elgalad's face went still. He stared at Vanimórë as if trying to open the closed doors behind his eyes, see into his soul. He did not speak.

“He shows remarkable confidence in you,” Elrohir remarked.

“Rather more in thee, I believe. And himself. He has hooks in thy mind, forget it not. I will tell thee more when we ride. Sleep if thou canst; we leave at first light.”

He was gone with a sinuous flurry of black hair. The breath eased out of Elgalad. He went to the fire, set a log on the ebbing flames. The light washed his face, caressed the rich curves of mouth and cheek.

Elrohir said, “Take any chance of escape you can.”

Elgalad rose. “I will have to,” he murmured. “Because they follow me, and they will be caught in this net.”

“Who follow?”

“I cannot say.” He stood looking down at the flames. “It is more difficult now. His power is very strong.” His hand went to where, under normal circumstances, he would have carried a dagger, but he bore no weapons. He turned.

“May I borrow thy knife?” he asked.

“What for?” For a moment, Elrohir thought that the other meant to kill himself, thus removing his value as a hostage. Elgalad met his eyes, seemed to read his thoughts. The lovely mouth bent.  
“His power muffles my mind, like a fortress wall about this place.” He stepped to the door, ran his hand over the worn carvings of bough, leaf, flower, that framed it. “Thranduil dwelt here once, when his father was king. But the imprint of that time is faint under the Dark Lord's will. My mind too, feels stuffed with sheepskins. The poisons, I suppose. And so, I must give something. Blood.”

“Blood?” No-one in Imladris really knew the secret rites of the wood-Elves, but Elrohir was not surprised that they involved blood. It was one of the oldest magics.

“Blood,” Elgalad said. “And fire to burn away the mists.”

With some reluctance and more fascination, Elrohir handed him the dagger. Elgalad sliced it across his palm, squeezed the welling blood into the flames.  
Elrohir gazed into the fire, thought he saw a flying wave of pale hair, green eyes like jewels. He had seen them before...then, as if a hand came down on it, the fire flattened, coughed smoke and cinders.

“He felt what I was doing,” Elgalad reached for wine to wash the smoke from his throat. “But I reached them.”

“What connects you to them?”

Elgalad sat down on a bench, stretched out his legs. Realizing that he was admiring the shapely length, Elrohir cast his gaze away.

“All the folk of the Wood are connected. Some more than others. The king is connected to them all, for he _is_ the Wood. As for what connects me, why, love. Is it not so with thee?”

Elrohir considered. “My twin and I are connected by love, yes.”

“If I were not here in Dol Guldur, I could reach any-one I loved easily.” Elgalad went to the table, tied a napkin around his cut hand with neat movements. “Bonds are forged when we partake of the Earth-rites.” He cast a little, smiling look toward Elrohir. “Shall I tell thee of them?”

 _No,_ But then: “There is little else to do.”

Almost a lifetime of self-loathing, self-denial and now Elrohir was locked in hot, shocked arousal as Elgalad spoke of the Earth-rites, held at midsummer and midwinter, in spring and autumn. In the summer, the King was a sacrifice; any and all could take him, so that he would spill his seed at last onto and into the Land, the Mother. The Winter King was, by contrast, the master, who took those he chose, the magic of the night filling his veins, his loins, so that he did not tire until the rebirth of the sun. Any-one could come together as lovers if they wished it. It meant nothing but pleasure, and there was always a bond thereafter.

“Thou art thinking it is barbaric.” A smile glinted in Elgalad's eyes. “But thou hast not known its beauty.”

“Beauty.” Elrohir's mouth twisted the word as he dropped it. He shuddered. How could there be beauty in depravity? He tried to fit the skin of a leering monster over Elgalad's face, but it fell away. “A King should have greater care of his people.”

“He does. The rites are _for_ us. He must give himself entire to his people and to the forest. In older times, the strongest would sire children at that time, though there has been no need since the Last Alliance.”

“But that would mean the King might sire many sons,” Elrohir said. “I have not heard that.”

“The King's seed is scattered thick through the forest,” Elgalad agreed. “But the women _choose_ to bear his children, and those children are _theirs_. It matters not who the sire is, save he is strong.”

“So he also has many heirs?”

“He has one. Siring a child for lineage is not the same. The woman must agree to it.” Elgalad ran a finger across his cut. “The King was in a blood-bond marriage when he begot Legolas. She is dead, but because Legolas is the child of the blood-bond, he carries the title of prince and heir.” His smile was a look back into some pleasurable memory. “Legolas was my first lover. I am not native, and so...” His voice fell away. He could not remember why he was not born here. Elrohir hoped he would think that, too the result of the toxic mists.  
“You were forced to go through this rite to be _accepted?_ ” Disgust thrilled through him.

“No-one is forced. I wanted it, to be part of the Wood. I was taught that the rites are very wild. I — and the King and Legolas — thought it would be good for me to know what it was like beforehand.”

“And you just lay down for him to take you as a dog takes a bitch?” Elrohir snarled.

The grey eyes dropped, but not with embarrassment. Elgalad was smiling again.  
“Legolas is very beautiful. Ice-gold hair, eyes like green jewels. He loves like a warrior and a bard.”

Elrohir turned away from him with a snap of teeth. He heard Elgalad's voice soften to teasing. A hint of laughter.  
“Even thou wouldst not be able to resist him.”

“What you speak of is not love,” Elrohir said in revulsion.

“Is it _not?_ ” Elgalad spoke with a sudden glowing passion. “How canst thou know?” Then his voice and eyes melted to a dangerous softness. “I see thy pain, burning inward like a thorn fire to make of thy soul a thing only of agony and violence, but— ”

“ _Stop!_ ” He threw up his hand, knew there was murder in his eyes, his heart. “That is none of your concern. _I_ am none of your concern. Be silent or whatever you are to the Dark Lord, prisoner, bargaining counter, I will _kill_ you, _whore._ ” One the word he seized Elgalad by the neck of his tunic, and dragged him close.

“Whore,” Elgalad repeated softly. “A word culled from Men, is it not? I have heard it in Esgaroth.” He was hard, his loins flush against Elrohir's. Nausea and fury rushed like acid through his mind.

 _Let him go._ The words were a command delivered on the edge of a saw. The walls seemed to slide inward. He saw the filthy, bony creature that had once been himself squatting mindless in a hole he had inhabited for who knew how long. Now Elladan was not there, only Elrohir, a thing unable to die.

The door slammed open. Vanimórë strode in, and his entrance was like clean fire, searing the vision to nothing. “Enough,” he snapped. “Thou art coming with me.” He indicated Elgalad. “The two of thee cannot be trusted together.” His eyes narrowed, as if he saw what Elrohir had. There was bleak recognition in them.

Elrohir stepped back, dropped his hand.  
“Were you listening outside?” He forced himself to sneer.

“Yes,” Vanimórë told him. “He is too much for thee, the way thou hast bound thyself. I am surprised it did not happen before now. Be glad I was here. I know what Sauron threatened thee with. He will do it, too. The choice is in thy hands, Elrohir. Come.” He gestured to Elgalad who looked at Elrohir with eyes that held nothing but brightness then went light, wordless, from the room. Vanimórë lingered to say, “Thou wilt feel better when thou hast shaken off this place. Trust me, I know. The nights are short. Dawn will come soon.”

Elrohir stared at the closing door, incredulous, furious. _Is he trying to comfort me?_ He dropped onto a chair, pressed his hands over his eyes. It was worse when alone. The image of himself reduced to something less than human struck at his fear like flint to tinder. He had to stop himself from going to the door, hammering on it, to bring Vanimórë and Elgalad back even to argue. It was better than this. He rose, got his unfinished wine and drank, shuddering. Unexpectedly, like a hand on his shoulder, came Vanimórë's voice into his mind. He said, _I know. I have feared that also. Elrohir, he really does not wish to waste thee. We will speak more when we are out of the forest._

Elrohir did not reply. Dimly, he heard the heavy closing of a door close by. So Elgalad had been moved only along the passage. It comforted him, and he railed against the weakness. But he feared being left here the next morning, that he had been lied to from the beginning, and would never leave this place.

 _I do not lie._ Vanimórë said, and Elrohir came to his feet.  
 _Stay out of my mind!_

_Proud fool._

He was gone, and there was silence. Elrohir leaned his face against the wall, closed his eyes, and closed hand to hand with the demons of fear that stalked him.

~~~

 


	12. A Temptation of Starlight

**~ A Temptation of Starlight ~**

 

~ Dawn came misty and still. The horse's hooves echoed mournfully as they rode out, the creaking wagons, empty now, coming behind. Vanimórë drew aside and reined in, watching them pass. There were five of them going north including the young soldiers Ryath and Kirin. These two also waited, smooth young faces wearing pride at having been chosen, and on all the Men's faces, relief at leaving Dol Guldur. Vanimórë waited until the last wagon trundled away, then raised his hand, turned his stallion to follow.

Elgalad looked back as the shadow of the fortress slid from his shoulders – and, as he watched, Dol Guldur...withered. There was no other word for it. Like the muscles of old men he had seen in Esgaroth, it shrank, towers pointing raggedly at the sky. It looked as if no-one had dwelt here for an Age. He heard Elrohir's exclamation of disbelief.

“Illusion,” Vanimórë said calmly. “This is what the White Council is supposed to see: A place abandoned.” His eyes flicked a message Elgalad could not interpret to Elrohir, who bent his head.

The forest was blighted, dark, the road cutting through it like a thrown spear. This twisted and lingering death of tree and plant smeared wrongness over Elgalad's soul, yet his heart felt lighter each league they rode. _Do not be a fool,_ he told himself. Vanimórë was the Dark Lord's servant, and Elgalad a hostage. Elrohir had bound himself with an Oath. And yet, there was hope. He had reached Legolas and Bainalph (Yes, he knew who had followed him) and they would not walk into the trap. They would already be riding back north, and the king had doubtless been warned. But it did not seem as if any attack was planned against the Woodland Realm. Sauron, Elrohir had told him, was waiting for the White Council. Still, Thranduil would prepare. He always had.

Elgalad watched: Elrohir, face blanked to an expressionless mask that could not hide his inner torment, Vanimórë calm as a summer evening. Two men bearing wounds that cleaved to the core of their souls, and oozed poison. Sauron's servant merely hid his pain more skilfully. Elgalad stared at him, but Vanimórë never returned his gaze.

It was unnaturally quiet. Each side of the road nettles, brambles, clusters of fungi grew rampant among long-dead tree stumps. Beyond, the forest marched into a gloom that even full daylight could not penetrate.  
 _Power._ He ran a hand down his mount's sleek neck. Thranduil had said it a long time ago. The power that flowed from Dol Guldur was too potent. What it touched, it warped, just as a too-bright sun will leach life from the earth. Howbeit, Elgalad was not afraid. He had been close enough to the Dark Lord to touch him, and perhaps shock had unseated fear.

As the long evening drew to night, they halted and camped. Elgalad saw how the men crowded close about their fires, and that Vanimòrë did not forbid them a drink of emberwine.  
And the dead came.

He rose from where he sat near a mute Elrohir, walked a few paces from their own fire, toward the pale shapes. Some of them he knew, comrades who had died, others had gone to their deaths long ago. His heart embraced them even as he murmured silent words of protection. The houseless might mean no harm, but they yearned for form and there were some, ensnared by the Dark, who were dangerous indeed.

They came no closer than the marge of the trees. Only on the Day of Souls were they permitted into the Woodland Realm, only then did the king let fall his veils of warding. And they would come, beloved and feared, to those they had once known. At dawn the melted away, left sorrow in their wake.

Elgalad closed his eyes. All Elves recognised the wrongness of death. They were not meant to die. There was a tale out of the Elder Days which said that one day Arda would be remade and the dead would return. Now, all he could do was hold vigil through the night, share his living self with their loneliness. He sank inward to the beat of his heart, the movement of blood in his veins, deeper, to all that loved and pitied. He gathered it and offered it, knowing it was not enough.

The dead stilled their restless movements, eyes fixed upon him. They gave him their lives, their deaths, and he accepted them, not knowing how he could bear it, aware only of them, until a hand on his shoulder brought him out of himself. Elrohir was staring at him. It was light, a thin mist over the ground, the soldiers were climbing from their beds in the wagons, stretching sleep from their muscles.

“You have been here all night.” Elrohir drew his hand away, straightened. “Vanimórë said you were...communing with the dead.”

Elgalad looked back into the woods. The houseless were invisible now, but still he felt them flocking about his soul. He ran his hands over his face, got to his feet.  
“I was. But how would he know?”

Elrohir lifted his shoulders and turned away. Vanimórë was walking among his men as they breakfasted. He did not look at Elgalad, which was the perfect opportunity to gaze without embarrassment. He needed to know more of this man if he wanted to escape. Could he be duped, reasoned with, (he was an Elf, whomever his master) could he be outfought? Elgalad was uncertain if Elrohir, vow or no, would stop him. The young soldiers would obey orders, but Vanimórë was the key. So far he had spoken barely a word to Elgalad, looked at him even less, but it would be foolish to doubt his vigilance, his adherence to Sauron's orders. The Dark Lord obviously valued him high. Here was no orc or Man, but Elvenblood. By the way he carried himself, he was a warrior-born.

Vanimórë strode across to Ryath and Kirin, who quickly got up. He gestured them back down, said something in the Eastern tongue, and smiled.

That smile was a summer sun rising. It dragged Elgalad's heart from his breast so that for a moment, he could not breathe. It was familiar. Some-one had smiled at him like that, but his memory held no trace of it. Perhaps one of the Earth Rites? One did not always remember them clearly. He took a step forward involuntarily, a question on his lips, and Vanimórë turned his head. The warmth faded to aloofness. He said, with that lovely courtesy: “When thou hast seen to thy horses, eat. We depart soon.” He paused. “I hope thou knowest what thou art doing. These houseless are not like those of Dol Guldur, but still they yearn for life.”

“They will not hurt me.” Elgalad said, and knew it was true.

Another night, then another, and the dead came. He could do nothing, only love them, grieve for them. The third night brought him something unexpected.

He walked in a vault of stars. A shape rose before him, outlined by the light, of a man impaled upon a cross. Black hair poured over his face, concealing all but his outstretched arms. Blood ran and ran from the wounds in his wrists. He made no sound, but his agony was a wall of screams.

Elgalad stepped toward him, and the man's head rose. It was Elrohir, face rinsed of anger, of pride, of hate, and what lay beneath was an anguish of self-loathing and pain that made physical torment as nothing. The grey eyes wept red tears. There was a wound in his breast, Elgalad thought, or no — no wound, rather a pulsing light as if his heart beat under transparent flesh. Elgalad touched it, and lightning struck through his fingers, up his arm. Elrohir's face changed, took on a shape of bone and skull subtly different, but so similar it was little more than a shift of light. His eyes burned like sun-struck diamonds. He spoke, though his pain-tight mouth did not move.  
“He lives on pain and hate and regrets, and I had no regrets but one. Yet I understand him. He must not, will not fall.”

Elgalad took the face in his hands “Elrohir,” he beseeched. “Let me help thee.”

“You cannot help him.”

He turned to see Elrohir, armed as for battle. There was no expression on his face.  
“He watched his mother raped, and was aroused by it. Perhaps he would have raped her too, had he not realised whom she was. Let him go into the Dark with his sins.”  
He stepped up to his crucified self, hefted a mallet, and slammed it down onto the nails, driving them deeper so that the other vision of himself screamed and writhed.

“No!” Elgalad cried, but the vision blew away like smoke, and the dream flung him into another place. Vast halls of shining black stone sluiced around him, took him deep into a world formed of darkness and power. A young Vanimórë fought shapes of wrath and flame. Burns spat like curses over his bare skin. Some-one laughed, rich, cold, and in the next eyeblink Elgalad saw Vanimórë raped, horrifically, by orcs, eyes slammed shut, jaw tight. And all the while Vanimórë's twin-image, older, contemptuous stood with folded arms and sneered, 'Weakling, whore. Too much of a coward to die. Thou deservest this, and more.” As the youth's closed eyes shed tears of agony and shame, and sweat pricked out on his body, ran down the hollowed curve of his back.

His cry of protest rose into the waking world. Elrohir's moonstone-coloured eyes, brilliant under dipped brows, stared into his  
“What happened?” He offered a cup of wine. Elgalad drained it. He could not speak.

“It is not wise to open yourself to the sorrows of the houseless.”

Elgalad rose. He wanted to draw Elrohir, all stiff resistant pride into his arms, and knew he would be denied. He said with difficulty: “They deserve all we can give” and went to his horse, needing time to regather himself from the dream. Save it was no dream. The houseless were real, and what he had seen of Elrohir and Vanimórë was real too. He had seen their souls, crucified and raped, and hated, by _themselves._

Over the mount's back, he saw Vanimórë. His heart beat heavily in his throat. _whore. Coward._ And Elrohir, hanging upon the cross he had made for himself. But who was the other he had seen and heard? He started as Elrohir moved into his line of vision.  
“You should eat,” he said shortly, and thrust flat bread and dried meat at him. “We will leave the forest today, he said. There will be good hunting in Rhovannion, but for now, eat.”

Elgalad said, “I thank thee,” and took the food. It was dust and ash in his mouth.

The sickened trees thinned as noon filled up the day, and at last the road cast itself from the forest. Their pace quickened, the Men as eager as Elgalad to see the plains unfold before them. The road, pounded into dry dust by the summer, poured south, straight to the Morannon, if the maps Elgalad had seen did not lie.

They spent one more night with the wagons. There were no houseless here, and the stars dewed the night sky so thickly that their light turned the air a luminous silver. The soldiers had hunted; some returned with fat grouse, two with deer. They were permitted to broach wine with their meal, and the sound of laughter rose from about the fires. Elgalad tilted his head, listening. He had believed all who served Sauron were monstrous, but these Men were little different to those of the northern villages or Esgaroth, save for their looks and language. Even that was not incomprehensible. Elves had a gift for tongues, and the more Elgalad listened, the more he understood. They were relieved to be out of Dol Guldur and Mirkwood's shadow, to be going home. Elgalad met Elrohir's light eyes, and the latter shook his head.

Vanimórë did not sit with them. He strolled among the soldiers, accepting meat here, a cup of wine there. They respected him; more, Elgalad realised, they loved him, though salted with a very natural fear. He as not, after all, a Man. Elgalad did not sleep. The visions crouched around him, and his rage burned against them. He understood Vanimórë and Elrohir now, or believed he did. There was no great mystery. Elrohir, raised in Imladris under _Golodhrim_ laws, did not understand battle-lust, and his mind had knotted together shame and desire. No-one could cut that knot but himself, and it was buried very deep. Vanimórë was another matter; he carried the guilt of a victim. Both men loathed themselves. Elgalad ached for them.

In the morning, they detached themselves from the soldiers. Elgalad saw Vanimórë talking to an older man, a veteran by his hard looks and calm eyes. Vanimórë handed him a scroll, and there was some business in one of the wagons that involved the chink of coins. Two pack-horses were readied, though Elgalad could not see what they carried. There was a brief speech to the men, who formed up, saluted and continued down the road. Vanimórë did not move until only their dust lingered in the warm air.

A lark's song fell from high up. The long grasses sighed under a brush of wind. Vanimórë turned his stallion. His face looked brighter, as if he, too, shed the weight of Dol Guldur.

“Well?” Elrohir's tone was cold. “You said you would explain where we were going.”

“And so I will.” Vanimórë replied. “We go to Esgaroth, and Erebor.”

“ _Erebor_ ” Elrohir stared, then flung back his head with a terrible laugh. “The dragon? He would wake it and... _use_ it?” He bared his white teeth. “I will have no part in this.”

“No, thou wilt not.” Vanimórë held his gaze and battled with it. “I am ordered to...assess the situation, no more, until I receive further orders from him. As for now, consider this journey a time of pleasure. I will.” It was the truth; Elgalad realised. It explained the light in his eyes as they moved to him. “I know thou wilt try to escape,” he said matter-of-factly. “I will prevent thee.”

“I expect no less.”

“Thou canst ride bound as a prisoner, or free if I have thy word.”

Elgalad put up his brows. “And wouldst thou trust it?”

“I think thou wouldst keep it.”

“Yes. If I gave it.” Under the heavy, brilliant regard, a blush burned over his cheeks. Elrohir, too, was watching him. He felt the familiar tingling ache of arousal in his loins, and was not even surprised. Both men were beautiful enough to burn the sun from the skies. And now he knew them, what they hid under the armour of their separate façades. They fascinated him, and he pitied them, was drawn to their pain as he had been drawn to the sorrow of the houseless. It was dangerous, but he had never yet barred his heart through fear.

“I will give thee my word,” he said. “Until Erebor.” It was a gamble, but anything he could learn of Sauron's plans would be useful. _Canst thou hear me, Legolas, Bainalph?_

The acknowledgements came as if through mist and water, still not clear.  
 _Dol Guldur still weighs on me._  
 _Erebor._ He tried to hone his mind into a bright silver arrow. _Only five of us: The Dark Lord's servant, Elrohir of Imladris, two young soldiers and myself. I will make no effort to escape until Erebor. We need to know more._

He sensed their shock, their protest, and knew they would too would go north.

Vanimórë inclined his head. “I hear thee. Then come.”

Elgalad told Legolas and Bainalph all that he knew, which was little. He had woken in the presence of Sauron, and for a long, chiming moment, thought the Dark Lord familiar. The recognition came on a double thump of his heart. (He did not say this, but remembered it).

Sauron had been a nameless enemy for so long that Elgalad had never tried to imagine his physical appearance. He was tall, fair, more than beautiful. His movements trailed grace and power, his eyes changed moment by moment from pale amethyst to fire. He was urbane, pitiless as death. Elgalad knew all that he was capable of, but he had not been afraid. He guessed the lingering poison in his blood had cushioned his perceptions, but still there was that most peculiar sense that he had seen Sauron before.

He had not been long in the Dark Lord's presence, only enough to know that he was a hostage, that his life depended on his good behaviour. He had been taken then to a comfortable chamber where he had seen Elrohir, who told him, emotionless, tight with tension, his own tale.

“We represent merchants out of Rhun if we need a story,” Vanimórë was saying now. “We carry samples.” He indicated the two pack-horses.

“We three will not pass as Men,” Elrohir said flatly.

“I have cloaks and veils; we will cover our faces.”

There were no roads here, only animal paths, and the wall of Mirkwood receded, though they kept it within view. The wind turned and blew steadily from the east, hot and dry, dropping only with the evening. Birds began to call from the scattered trees, and the air smelled of dry grass and peace. Vanimòrë found, after some searching, a small spring. It welled through a knot of mossy boulders into a pool barely an ell wide, but was deep and fresh. They watered the horses and let them graze on the tough, sweet grass. No fire was lit, and they ate cold meat from the evening before, and dried fruit washed down with water and later, a cup of mead.

Ryath and Kirin sat together and spoke quietly. Vanimórë and Elrohir were silent, ignoring Elgalad completely. After a while of watching them, he saw that they were indeed speaking, but mind-to-mind, only the slight inflections of their bodies to show their communication. He supposed that if they were speaking of Mordor he, Elgalad, could not be allowed to hear.  
He thought of his visions, and rage tangled with sadness. Elrohir could not serve Sauron, vow or no. It was abhorrent to think of. How Vanimórë had come to slavery, Elgalad could not imagine. He had been young; that was the only conclusion.  
 _Two men who need rescuing._

Later, the young Men and Elrohir slept, or seemed to. Vanimórë walked the perimeter of the small camp in a wide arc, his steps soundless. At whiles he would halt in his perambulations to gaze into the night. Elgalad rose and intercepted him.  
“Elrohir must not do this,” he murmured. “And I do not think thou doth want him to.”

Vanimórë stirred. He smelled of leather and spices from faraway lands.  
“What I want has no relevance. He has bound himself, and truly I think he had no choice.”

“Then the vow must be broken by others.”

“Perhaps it will be.” He walked away as if the brief conversation was over. Elgalad followed him, caught his arm. Vanimórë turned to him.  
“Excuse me,” he said, dangerously mild. The sinews of his arm were like steel. “I cannot aid him,”  
“Perhaps not, but I think thou wouldst.”

“I am Sauron's slave.”

“And more.”

Vanimórë stared at him, and then his mouth bent in a tight smile.  
“Whatever else, I am a slave first and foremost. Do I think Elrohir's brother will rouse Imladris to release him? Yes, of course.”

“This journey is too sudden and propitious,” Elgalad said slowly, thinking. “If thou hadst taken him – us – to Mordor we would be beyond aid. But thou art going North, with two hostages, and two youths scarce at their majority, warriors though they are. This makes no sense. No-one ever said of the Dark Lord that he was a fool.”

“He is not a fool,” Vanimórë agreed. “Thou wert both to go to Mordor, yes, but plans change, and there are matters that Sauron considers more important. He could have sent the both of thee to Mordor under guard, but there are reasons why he gave thee into my charge. Perhaps it is a test, of me as much as Elrohir.”

“Then he thinks thou needs must be tested.”

Vanimórë raised a hand.  
“Thou shouldst not speak to me as if I am an ally. I am thy captor, not a friend.”

“Not an enemy, either.” _I have seen thy soul._ His hand still gripped Vanimórë's arm, who now laid his fingers over it as if to lift it away. Elgalad's heart bounded like a stag's with a hunter in pursuit, and he felt Vanimórë's pulse through his flesh.  
“Thou art not what thou thinkest.” His throat tightened.

“What I think?” The haughty brows lifted, and he wrenched away but Elgalad maintained his grip, and was pulled against the tall, lean body — a body as hot and aroused as his own. His loins felt heavy with blood. Vanimórë's face was luminous in the thick starlight, alien in his beauty. Elgalad's insight, flanked by his vision, offered him a revelation: It did not matter that Vanimórë was Sauron's slave, what he had done in his service; all that was of import was _what had been done to him_.

Vanimórë shuddered, a tremor that racked his frame, and Elgalad kissed him. One hand slid about Vanimórë's neck, the other his hard-muscled back, sinking through silk hair. For a heartbeat, there was no give in the firm lips, though Vanimórë's heart pounded through his breast like a drum. His resistance did not last long. There was lava in his blood, and it broke from his control like a storm. Elgalad felt as if he fell through black, sharp ice into the sun, felt the naked truth of the man beneath the perfect construction of his outer form. And what was beneath it he wanted with a need that sent him surging against Vanimórë's body, their loins grinding together. There were hands in his hair, on his buttocks, pulling him closer, his own dragged down Vanimórë's back to his hips. He felt for the belt, unloosed it, pulled the breeches apart, as slim fingers freed him. The familiar sensation of flesh-against-flesh almost pushed him over the edge into release. He loved and made love wholeheartedly, took deep, fierce pleasure in his lovers, but it seemed to him, striving, breathless, that he had waited all his life for this man, this moment. And now he wanted to take him, plunge into the hot depths of Vanimórë's body, to possess him, give him the kind of pleasure that shook the soul, that left one scorched and fey with ecstasy. After his vision he had wondered if Vanimórë shunned intimacy, had allowed the scars grow over his wounds like the horny bark of an oak. Elgalad had no doubt he _was_ wounded. Elves could die of rape, and feared rape by orcs (who used rape as a weapon of war) far more than death in battle. Vanimórë's response denied his pain with an aggression more eloquent than words.

But now, he could not wrench himself from the pulsing strength that throbbed against his own, not even to fetch the oil they carried to treat their gear. Later, he thought, far away, wrapping a hand around their lengths, fire-hot with blood. Vanimórë made a sound as if he were drowning. His hands locked about Elgalad's hips. The tension climbed unbearably with each stroke. Elgalad's pulse pounded, their fevered reaches for breath mingled. Eru, the building of it was too much; he felt he must shatter into the night. When they came, he did, and the stars fell and exploded within him.

He slid to his knees, Vanimórë following him. He did not stop until they were both dry, then licked the salt-musk seed from his fingers with a long sigh of repletion.  
“Ah, yes,” he whispered, and with a sudden hunger familiar to him from those days and nights of sexual magic in the forest, he crashed again into a kiss like a storm, only breaking it to whisper, “I will get some oil. I promise thee, it will be good for thee.”

Vanimórë pushed him away.  
“No.” His voice came rough.“Enough.”

“We have not even begun.” Elgalad was untroubled by the sudden retreat, though a little puzzled.

Their hair had come loose in their passion; a dark wave half-hid Vanimórë's face. Elgalad lifted the silken weight over a straight shoulder.  
“Art thou not permitted to dally with thy captives?”

“I do not take advantage of them.” Elgalad choked on involuntary laughter, but Vanimórë went on: “I have a great deal of experience of captives, men and women both. I know what despair and fear can drive a prisoner to. Many believe that sexual favours will soften their captors, spare them their fate, even grant them freedom.”

“ _That_ is what thou art thinking?” Elgalad stared, and the incredulous laughter shook him again. “Thou hast experience of captives but little else, it seems. I do not seek to buy my freedom with sex. I want thee.”

“Why?”

“ _Why_?” He reached out a hand. “Thou art magnificent.”

Vanimórë caught his wrist with a whip-fast movement. In the star-pale air a grimace flitted across his face. His voice, when he spoke, was thick with frost. “I know precisely what I am. ” He released Elgalad's hand. “Return to the camp.”

“I do not think thou hast the slightest knowledge of what thou art. Wouldst thou tell me thou doth not want me?”

“Hardly. Any-one would want thee.”

“Then let me have thee.”  
  
Vanimórë shook his head.“I give myself to no man willingly.”

Of course. He had been raped. Proud, naturally dominant, the thought of offering himself would be abhorrent to Vanimórë. It was understandable, if foolish, for no man was less than a man if he played the doe. Elgalad found great pleasure in both taking and being taken.  
“Then have me,” Elgalad offered, smiling.

Vanimórë fastened his breeches, snapped the belt through its buckles and rose. “No.”

More slowly, Elgalad joined him.  
“Thy life is abhorrent to thee, yet thou wouldst forgo pleasure?”

“Not always.” He twisted his hair into a loose knot. “Thou art like some-one I once knew. I would not have used him for pleasure. I will not use thee.”

“There is no question of usage.” Elgalad's heart cracked for this man who who could not see his true self, who strove to barricade himself against life. “I thought perhaps thou wert like the Noldor, like Elrohir, with their tales of damnation for what they see as unnatural love.”

“The damnation I know to be true. I cannot say it concerns me. My life is not as theirs. Now, go back to the camp.” He moved suddenly, a sense of fury radiating from him. Just as quickly, he stilled. “Elgalad.” His mouth stroked the name, sent hot tendrils delving into Elgalad's groin. “No more. I cannot afford what thou wouldst give me.”

He strode back to the camp. Elgalad laced his breeches and followed, saw Elrohir come to his feet, and walked straight into his snarl of: “Can you not bridle your lusts even for a night?”

“Why should I?” Blood still running high, Elgalad smiled.

“Enough,” Vanimórë said. “The Elves of the Wood are not like the Noldor, Elrohir. He did naught wrong save offer pleasure to one who cannot accept it.”

Elrohir whirled to face him. “You _accepted_ it willingly enough!”

“If thou wert not such a hidebound fool, so wouldst thou.”

The knife kindled in the dark. Its slash would have opened Vanimórë's throat had he not grabbed Elrohir's wrist. The metal pulsed between them, hot and white. Elgalad saw the _peredhel's_ muscles strain, the expert move that sent the dagger plunging to the grass. Saw the raw, hate filled kiss that roused him fully again. If this were the forest, he would have joined them. Elrohir's palm pressed flat against Vanimórë's breast, his free hand fisted in the loose knot of hair as they strained together, loins thrusting. Lust at its most maddening and inflammatory poured from them like heat. Then, with a sudden, violent move, Elrohir pushed away, swearing. He swept his dagger from the grass, thrust it into its sheath and flung himself into the night, a lithe, powerful figure against the star-washed sky. Vanimórë, seemingly unconcerned, sat down, began to braid the disordered mane of his hair.

Elgalad swallowed desire like wine, said breathless: “Should we not go after him?”

Vanimórë shook his head. “He but walks off his rage. He is a man who stabs at a festering wound.”

“Yes.” Elgalad wanted to touch him, knew he would be rebuffed, knew also that Vanimórë would flash into fire if he could once again break down those barriers. And Elrohir...Yes, he, too. “And so art thou.”

 

~~~

 


	13. ~ Dark Mirrors ~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I have to write more than a few words about a character I have rarely written and is not in my 'verse except for brief appearances/mentions here and there: Galadriel. As I have no real 'feeling' about her, and having read Ziggy and Encairion's Galadriel I asked them if I could borrow. They were kind enough to permit it. This allows the Galadriel of Dark Star to tie in with Ziggy's Galadriel in More Dangerous, Less Wise. You can find links to Ziggy and Encairion's pertinent chapters in the end notes.
> 
> Please note that as in my 'verse, Glorfindel is a son of Finarfin, and older brother to Galadriel.  
> *[From Ziggy’s More Dangerous, Less Wise. Chapter 27. The Mirror.](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=891&textsize=0&chapter=27) which also shows Elrohir and Haldir's meeting.
> 
> ‘You wish to fill your senses with them!’ He turned towards her then, accusing, ‘You want to absorb the sense of them into your skin, _breathe_ them,’ he said and took two strides to stand before her so close she could feel his breath. His blue eyes pierced her anew and he _saw_ her. _Let them be!_
> 
> [Encairion’s The Price of Vengeance. Chapter 33: The Visionary.](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=764&textsize=0&chapter=33) This chapter shows Galadriel in a very different light to most stories, but I can imagine it being true. And my Galadriel here would definitely do this.

* Dark Mirrors * 

 

Tindómion's relationship with Galadriel had never been easy. He was a Fëanorion, and her hatred — a strong word but true — went back to the Years of the Trees, when Fëanor had requested of her a hair from her head, and she had refused him. Through the Ages of hating his father, wearying though it increasingly became, Tindómion yet felt protective toward the dead and the lost.

He had become accustomed and inured to suspicion in Lindon, but Galadriel's focus was more personal. It rubbed at him like a thorn caught in clothing, but he never voiced his annoyance. Galadriel was revered, one of the Wise, an Exile. More pertinently, she was grandam to Elladan and Elrohim, sister to Glorfindel, and if Tindómion never, now, journeyed to Lothlórien, Galadriel visited Imladris at times.

Tindómion's mother had raised him as a nobleman, and he had lived in the beautiful, poisonous court of Gil-galad where eyes were always on one's back, (especially on his and the high king's). He could enact the courtier. Thus, in his rare interactions with Galadriel he was scrupulously polite.  
It made no difference. She did not like him, and more lay behind that than his bloodline. Celebrián had favoured him, and he had escorted her to Lothlórien for many years, but he was not with her when she was taken by orcs. With Glorfindel and the twins, he had ridden north whence had come reports of orcs gathering in great numbers near Gundabad. After, Galadriel's eyes bleached with accusation when she looked at him. He gathered that he should have been more attentive in his duties to Celebrián. But he was lieutenant of the Imladrian army. His allegiance to Glorfindel as its captain took precedence. He had been needed in the North. And so. He had failed Celebrián, and in doing so, had failed Galadriel.

The White Council was gathering. It was customary to meet in Imladris but, because of Elrohir, Lóthlorien was the obvious choice, closer to Dol Guldur. Elrond was there, Glorfindel, Erestor and Tindómion. A message had gone to Círdan before they left Imladris. Mithrandir and Curunír had been called.

“You knew, all of thee, what he was becoming.” Galadriel's furious gaze struck Elrond like a whip, then struck at Glorfindel and Erestor. The lash flicked Tindómion last. “And did nothing.”

“What would you have had us do?” Elrond asked. “We cannot turn back time, bring his mother back.” His voice ached. “He has grown distant to me, will not let me close to him.”

“You are the healer,” she said. “His ills are of the soul. They should have been rooted out before he was entirely poisoned and ripe for Sauron's call.” She turned to Glorfindel. “And both of them take too much pleasure in death. He should never have been allowed to keep that sword.”

“You _know_ where Elrohir's ills spring from, and what poisons him,” Glorfindel returned, and his face was limned with anger. “Aicanáro is the least of them. And there is little I or any-one could have done. One does not change a person from the outside in, Galadriel. That is the work of Morgoth.”

There was a movement of air at the doorway of the great _talan._ Elladan entered. He was dressed for riding, as if he had just returned from a patrol. There was a look about him of furious energy scarce reined-in. His face, as he cast a look over them all, showed relief.  
“None of you know him as I do,” he said without greeting or preface. “And there are places within him barred even to me. But are you going to stand here and apportion blame, or confront Sauron?”

“We cannot do so without Mithrandir and Curunír,” Galadriel told him.

“Cannot, or will not?”

“Cannot.” Her voice came heavy, underlining the word. “For this, the Council must work as one. Elladan —” She stretched out a hand. “I _know._ I know thy fear. _I_ am afraid for him. But all will be for nothing if we move too swiftly. Thou hast said _he_ will not harm Elrohir— ”

“Sauron has already harmed my brother,” Elladan cried, visibly losing his temper. “His Oath, what Sauron threatened me — us — with. He clings to sanity by a hair!”

Galadriel crossed to him swiftly. He was taller than she. Tindómion, watching, saw her eyes punch into his, a look that very few could meet or deny. He saw her slight recoil. There was a trace of confusion on her face.  
“Canst thou still reach him?” she demanded.

“I cannot.” Tindómion glanced at Glorfindel to see if he caught the lie. He did. So did Erestor. “Not since I left Dol Guldur.”

“Do not forget,” Glorfindel interposed. “We have more than one ally there.”

Galadriel turned to him. “I think not,” she told him. “This slave, Vanimórë—” She cut the name into sharp syllables with her tongue. “He was free after the Last Alliance. Now, he serves his master again. I doubt very much he is an ally. Art thou even certain it was he whom reached for thee?”

“I am certain.”

“Elladan has told us that Sauron captured a wood-Elf he loves, that he will do naught that might endanger him.”

“Sauron needed that hold over Vanimórë,” Glorfindel said. “Otherwise he _would_ have interceded in any way he could. I know him. I saw him fight Sauron's will. If he can find a way to aid Elrohir without it harming this one he loves, he still may. At least he will not prevent us from doing anything.”

Her head shook. “He is a slave of the Dark Lord. He cannot be trusted.”

Tindómion saw the beautiful curl of Glorfindel's mouth press thin. Elladan stared at his grandmother.  
“He is a slave, but an unbroken one. He would have aided us in escaping Dol Guldur; it was we who demanded to be brought before Sauron.”

Her brows crooked. “Yes, so you told me.” She let out a breath. “Well, I would have done the same. But do not forget that this man _is_ bound to Sauron, and therefore you _cannot_ trust him.”

“What does the mirror show?” Elrond asked in an obvious bid to turn the subject.

“I cannot see Elrohir or Sauron.” One long hand clenched. Nenya flashed. “Neither do I think it wise to try the latter. I am hidden from him. I do not intend to _invite_ him into Lothlórien. Let him see me when we strike at Dol Guldur, not before.”

Elladan turned in the doorway, looked back, the message clear in his eyes. Tindómion excused himself. It would be long before Curunír, head of the Council would arrive, but he was not inclined to be patient. And Elladan had something to say.

They met in Elladan's _talan_ ; Erestor and Glorfindel were not far behind Tindómion. Glorfindel passed a finger across his lips indicating they not speak aloud. Elladan poured them wine, leaned against door-frame.

_My grandam may not be able to see,_ he said. _Did you know Elrohir can bar her from his mind? He loathes being spied on, as he calls it. But he and I are still bound. He is no longer in Dol Guldur._

For a frozen moment they stared at him.  
 _Where?_ they spoke as one.

_Rhovannion. Heading north to Esgaroth and Erebor. Five of them only, Elrohir, Vanimórë, Elgalad, and two young warriors._ His ice-grey eyes took the infalling green light and shattered it into sparks.

_Erebor?_ Glorfindel repeated.

_Vanimórë has been ordered to assess the situation there._

_Hells. Sauron has his eyes upon that dragon._

Tindómion's gut tightened. He had been too young to fight in the War of Wrath, had never seen a dragon, but the story of Smaug's attack on Dale and Erebor, the awful firestorm, had come over the mountains. Dragons were weapons of terror.

_What does Elrond say?_ Erestor asked then, after a moment of silence: _You have not told him._

_No,_ Elladan acknowledged. _I fear that if they know Elrohir is not in Dol Guldur, they will decide not to attack._ He threw a hand behind his neck and gripped it. _But this time they must._ His eyes were burning starlight. _And, if Sauron's mind and power are focused elsewhere, it may be easier for us to help Elrohir. I pressed for them to strike swiftly, knowing they could not. I do not want my grandam or father to know I have other plans._

Tindómion looked at Glorfindel, at Erestor.

_Curunír has always spoken against a direct confrontation,_ Glorfindel nodded. _He will argue. Delay._

_It will take him some time to arrive,_ Tindómion said. _And then the discussions will begin. It gives us time to ride north and intercept Elrohir. I will go with you, Elladan._

_As will I,_ Erestor said.

Glorfindel settled a hand on Elladan's shoulder. _I want you to tell us everything that happened in Dol Guldur. Everything._

The daylight faded as Elladan related his tale. Tindómion saw fury rise in the others eyes, felt his own muscles tighten until he could not sit any longer. He wanted to ride into Dol Guldur and wrap his hands around Sauron's throat, see his face grow crimson, and his eyes burst with blood. He heard again, the crack of bone as the Dark Lord's mailed foot descended with deliberate weight on Gil-galad's chest. He closed his eyes and tried to push the memory away only for Elladan's story to singe itself into his mind: The twins bound to crosses, threatened with gelding, with Agelong imprisonment, Vanimórë brought to his knees to be raped by uruks...

He forced himself away from the horror to the one event he could not understand. They had all felt it, heard the radiant clamour of the souls imprisoned in the Dark.

_Fingolfin's memories,_ Elladan said. _Not knowing them as a tale, but feeling them, and seeing Fëanor in Elrohir. I still know them. Yet I am not possessed._

Glorfindel looked into his eyes.  
 _I have always seen him in you, as I have seen Fëanor in your brother. No, I do not think you or he are possessed. I think their souls passed through you when they aided you. Perhaps something of them remains._ He stepped away. There was a shining of rage about him as he raised his head.  
 _We must think on this while we ride._

_You are part of the Council,_ Elladan protested without much conviction. _They will need you._

_They will set power against power,_ Glorfindel said. _The Three and Curunír._  
Not many people knew that Mithrandir had been gifted Narya, the red ring of fire, by Círdan, but it was more or less an open secret among the upper echelon of Imladris.  
 _I am a warrior. Lothlórien can muster warriors enough._

_You are more than that._ Tindómion remembered Angmar. _You are a legend men will follow, even the Galadhrim, even to their deaths._

_If we do not use this opportunity to help Elrohir, we may never get another._ Glorfindel threw his blazing blue gaze around them all. _They cannot slay Sauron. My feeling is that he will retreat, maybe to Mordor. Or if not Mordor there are many lands that still worship him._

Elladan said, _Vanimórë came from Mordor. We think of it as deserted and barren, and that is a grave mistake. While Sauron has been in Dol Guldur, Mordor has been a-building itself anew._ He took a mouthful of wine. _I said Vanimórë was more than a slave. He is. Elrohir told me that he is Commander-in-Chief of Sauron's armies._

Glorfindel went still. _Indeed? I cannot say it surprises me. So Mordor waits for its Lord._

_He wishes to_ test _the Council, not engage them in all-out war._

_It makes sense. You have told them?_

_Yes._

_So. When he has tested them enough, he has an escape route planned, and then he will call Vanimórë and Elrohir to him. There will be no other chances._ Glorfindel paced like a great golden cat. _I will tell them we wish to reconnoiter the margins of Mirkwood, and so we will, but then we will ride North._

Elladan gripped his arm. _Thank-you,_ he said simply. _All of you. Thank-you._

They gathered around him. He embraced each one.

OooOooO

Starlight shimmered and blinked in the Mirror. No wind touched its surface, yet the water shivered, lapped the sides of the silver bowl. Tindómion frowned down at it. _Things that were,_ Galadriel said of it. _Things that are. Things that may be._ His dreams would be more clear but, in this matter, they had not helped him. When the Void gaped open, he had felt the souls whose blood he shared. But not his father's. He had not expected to. Maglor lived and he, too would have sensed the beloved dead.

Tindómion had spent so long hating the man who raped his mother. Trying to hate. Fanari said she had forgiven Maglor even during the act. Unfathomable woman. He loved and respected her deeply, but she was a mystery. Through her he was half Gondolindhrim, could have claimed the title of Lord of the House of the Pillar and the Tower of Snow. He never had. Fanari told him he was Fëanorion, the stamp of his father save for his hair, bronze where Maglor's was black. It was true. The dreams that had assaulted him and given him, whether he wanted it or not, his father's history, had shown him how like Maglor he was. And Fanari said he must find his father, be reconciled. Tindómion had tried, but there was no trace only, sometimes, the sound of harping in the night, heartbreaking, flawless. He did not even know, waking, if it were real, or part of his dreams. What he did know, or had come to accept was, there was no denying his bond with Maglor. Both Erestor and Glorfindel had told him of the love and passion that ran like chains of fire between the Fëanorions. Tindómion could not escape them. He had always worn them, willingly or no.

He had not visited Lothlórien since before Celebrián was taken, and his times there had always been brief. He had never before considered asking Galadriel to use the Mirror to seek out Maglor, but now the far-off thunder of urgency edged his thoughts. There would be war with Sauron again. Perhaps not yet, but it would come, and the Elves could not march an army to Mordor this time. There were too few of them now.

Tindómion would never leave Middle-earth for Valinor. When war rose in the East and broke finally over Imladris, (as it would) he would fight and, sooner or later, he would die. There was not much time. If he were ever going to find Maglor it must be soon. It would be foolish not to use the Mirror. He could not afford the chance pass him by.

He was alone. Galadriel was still in council. He should, of course, have requested her permission, but doubted she would accede. And he was not certain, now, that he wanted to look. Yet he had come.

No mallorns grew in this enclosed garden, but they rose like clouds beyond, twined with spiralling stairs, aglow with lamps. Lothlórien was beautiful but had always felt alien to Tindómion, like stepping into a slow dream. The hard edges of life were were softened. He did not need or want that; it blurred the past, and the past, for all its pain, held love.

He stared into the water, tension clenching a fist under his breast. Resistance. There was too much lingering hate. He had imagined, when he was younger, of finding his father, planting his sword in Maglor's guts and ripping it upward. Rapists should pay for their crimes. His mother would be avenged—

_He is nothing. He doomed himself, slew women and children and for what? Not the Silmarils, not even for the Oath. For his father, a madman who overstepped every boundary, who truly loved nothing and no-one save himself._

But no. That was not true. Tindómion had _been_ Maglor in his dreams, (if one could call them dreams), seeing and hearing through his eyes. Fëanor's had loved like wildfire. Not an easy love, but there was nothing lacking.

_His father...A betrayer who lead the Noldor out of Aman, and left them to turn tail and limp back to Valinor or cross the Ice._

And yes, so he had, in the madness of rage and grief.

_Insanity. Murder. Rape. This is the heritage thou wouldst embrace?_

Quite deliberately, he stepped away from the mirror, turned.  
“I will not usurp your prerogative,” he said to Galadriel. “There is some truth in your words, but you see through your own dark mirror, lady.”

Nenya flashed like her eyes.  
“I speak truth.”

“I know why you hate them.”

“Do not presume, Fëanorion!” she warned.

“Do you think to anger me by naming me thus?” he asked. “My mother has always told me I am Fëanorion. They betrayed you, yes. And they paid for it all, oath, betrayal, kinslaying. All.”

“Fëanorions.” she said again, crossing to the Mirror. “Thou seest the world from such a height.”

And there it was. He knew, through his dreams. Once, Fëanor had seen something in her he wanted, then forgotten her like a dropped pin. She was said to be as strong as will, as blazing as he had been, a match for him. But Galadriel spun her own sweet-tasting tales. Still, she had never repented, never left Middle-earth to sue for pardon before the Valar. She did not bend, and he could admire that. But her daughter had been broken, and if Galadriel ever wished to see her again, she would have to bow her head and make that last journey.

She passed a hand over the surface of the water and, for a long time stood motionless. He thought she had forgotten him, and walked away. She whirled with a hush of white robes.  
“My grandsons,” she said. “idealised the wrong people: thou, and Erestor and Glorfindel. They are nothing like their mother, nothing like Elrond.”

“What do you want me to say?” Tindómion wondered.

“In love with the sword,” she continued. “In love with blood and vengeance, listening to tales of death and glory. And so much like _them._ ”

Them. “Blood will tell.”

Her eyes raked him. “And their mentors lovers of men, turning them to barren, lawless desires—”

Tindómion put up a hand. “Please,” he said, tasting the old hate and disgust of Lindon in his mouth. “You are wiser than that.”

“I care naught if a man beds with a man, or a woman a woman.” Her mouth curved disdainfully. “This is Lothlórien. There were Silvans here long before I came. They knew nothing of the Laws, and would not keep them. And I lived in Doriath. But _I_ know them, the penalty for breaking them, _as dost thou_. Thou hast only confused my grandsons, so they lust after forbidden fruit. And one day, they will be judged for it.”

“I can assure thee,” he said carefully. “that none of us have toyed with Elladan and Elrohir. We love them too well. But they are their own men, Galadriel.”

“If they had been raised here...” She cropped her own words as if a thought intruded. “Many things I suspected but did it know until this.” Her hand swept toward the Mirror. “Things that were...Erestor who loved a Fëanorion, Glorfindel who was marked by Fëanor and thou, son of Maglor, son of rape. Thou knowest of what I speak. And my grandsons were drawn into the net. I will not allow them to doom themselves. When Elrohir is safe, I will cleanse him of this festering ill. I will break them both free of the glamour thou hast all cast over them. They are my blood, my flesh.”* Pain and fury shone like nacre in her eyes. He understood it. Elladan and Elrohir were all she had left of her daughter. He knew, too, what she spoke of, secrets she had learned by spying in that damned Mirror, things she had no need to see. As for Elrohir, he would be more likely to be driven mad than healed if Galadriel rooted in the hidden hollows of his soul. But Elrohir would not come here, he vowed. If she had her way she would keep the twins in Lothlórien, try to make them hers.

“Lady.” He inclined his head in a farewell.

“Hold,” she raised a hand. “Dost thou not wish to look in the Mirror, then?”

He put up his brows. “You would permit it?”

“I did not think my permission was important to thee,” she returned, acerbic. “But why not? Perhaps thou shouldst. It has been a long, long time since Maglor passed out of knowledge. If he is alive— ”

“He lives,” Tindómion cut her off. “I am surprised you do not know that.” He wondered if she had ever looked. It would be surprising if she had not. Her face gave nothing away, and he would not ask. If she had seen Maglor, she had never told him, and would not now.  
“He will be much changed.” She swept her fingertips around the rim of the bowl, breathed upon the water. “ Look, then.” Her eyes were on him, light, secret. “Do not touch the water,” she cautioned.

Tindómion looked into the bowl.  
“Show me,” he commanded it.

OooOooO

 


	14. ~ Out of the Woods ~

**Out of the Woods**

 

The stars drew back. Fire blossomed, lighting the gnarled bark of a tree. A small traveller's fire in some lonely place. The light flowed up a long leg in boots and breeches, an arm, thick hair braided, black as polished obsidian.  
Tindómion's breath stopped.

The man's gear was simple, but it was not wayworn and, for a moment, disappointment sickened him. This could not be Maglor. Then the bowed head lifted, the flames caressed his face, and Tindómion knew it as his own; the high curve of the cheeks, the sinful mouth, the straight line of the nose, and the eyes under the precise arch of black brows. Those eyes _blazed._ Like his, they were silver under lashes thick as feathers. They were not hollow, empty or insane but they held sorrow enough to drown the world. A shudder ripped Tindómion from head to heels. What he felt then was not love but the pull of blood, inescapable, powerful. He still could not breath. Too many emotions were splitting his chest, pouring out like lava, agonising and unbearable.

Maglor's eyes widened as if some-one had called his name.

Tindómion had never imagined calling Maglor 'father'. But blood went deeper than hate, deeper even than oaths.  
 _Father?_

_Father,_ the word echoed. _Father. Fatherfather._

And he saw another face shine forth, beloved, _Oh, so terribly, passionately loved._ It was transcendently beautiful; eyes like diamonds blasted apart the darkness that caged him. Then through the light came an undulating land of grass and scattered trees, horsemen riding. Tindómion saw Elrohir. All in black he was, and his face was formed of ice and marble, an impenetrable mask. The horses slowed and there was Vanimórë, another Elf, silver-haired, with a lovely, radiant face, two Men, young, with the high cheeks and uptilted eyes of the East. Vanimórë seemed unchanged from the time of the Last Alliance, vivid and dangerous. Now, as then, nothing in his self-possessed bearing so much as hinted at his slavery. He said something. Elrohir stared at him, responded briefly with a flash of his eyes and a snap of white teeth, then both of them lifted their heads like wolves scenting the air, startled. It was unnerving to realise they were so similar; almost they might have been brothers, black haired, skin white as milk, those luminous, perilous eyes. The riddle of Vanimórë's origins teased at him. If ever a man were born to command...but then Sauron saw that too, and used his talents.

A blink of darkness and he saw Elrohir again. There were stars in a hard, black sky, the shape of enormous, ruined stonework. An Elf was walking toward him, pale hair drifting. He came close, spoke, and then his hands slid through Elrohir's hair. A trick of the starlight traced his face. It was beautiful, but a stranger's face. Or was it? Tindómion did not know him, but there was a familiarity in the graceful bones, the sumptuous mouth. He felt vast tension, sorrow, rage, _desire_ , saw the glint of green eyes...Was this the past? The future? Tindómion thought he should recognise the place, but it faded into a kiss he felt in his loins.

*  
A different face now, and one which Tindómion had not expected to see. And this _was_ the past: Ost-in-Edhil in its glory. Annatar, imposing, beautiful mouthing words of temptation: _“Gil-galad would do anything for thee..._ anything. _Ask him to permit me into his realm and I will find thy sire and thou shalt find...so much more.”_

They had not known what was to come, whom Annatar truly was, the war he would unleash on them. Those days now seemed golden, even innocent, a child's memories of summer. But why was the mirror showing him such a vision? Or was it aware of his thoughts of Elrohir and Sauron?

 

Fumes of mist rose from the bowl. Annatar's eyes (lavender-coloured, Tindómion remembered) might have been looking straight into his. They changed, gleaming, to red fire, to gold...

Dimly he heard Galadriel say, “Enough!”

He wrenched his thoughts back to his father. The fiery eyes faded. Maglor's face returned, alert, puzzled. He was rising to his feet, elegant as a cat, eyes searching. A sword was in his hand...

_Let this be now. Let this not be the past._ Tindómion's heartbeat choked him. _Father._  
He felt the link between them. Chains of fire, of pain, of love. The weight of a history. His birthright.

Flames rippled across the water. He heard laughter.  
 _Tindómion Maglorion._ The voice smiled. _I could have found him for you._

A ring twisted in his vision, sapphire and ruby, then melted in the forge-fire that had destroyed it.

_I could have given you everything. Was it worth it, all the death, and to lose him forever?_

There was not a day Tindómion did not ask himself that question. And now he knew what, or rather whom, he would see next. He did not want to, did not need to. All he had to do was _think._ He spent most of his life trying not to.

He saw, anyway. Not the beginning nor the terrible end, but a time between, after a council that had drawn both Mithlond and Ost-in-Edhil to Lindon. After the last people had left the chamber, Gil-galad had removed the crown, handed it to a page and rose, stretching long limbs. He shunned none of the duties of a high king save marriage, but the Spring Council, held after Nost-na-Lothion, had been attended by weather like a foretaste of summer; the north was ablaze with blossom and new growth. It was not a time to be shut behind stone walls. Gil-galad, whom, with the lift of one hand had commanded Tindómion to remain, came across to his seat  
“Come.” He brought his hands down on Tindómion's shoulders, smiling. “Wine in my garden, I think, Istelion. Let us relax a while.”

Tindómion, even in vision, was dazzled again by the high king's beauty, the blaze of blue-silver eyes in the high-cut face, the brilliance of his smile. They had walked out, hip-to-hip, heads turned toward one another as they spoke. Those had been the good days, before love ate away at his soul, before it became unbearable because it could not be consummated. There had been companionship under the tension. He had not realised for a long time that Gil-galad actually needed him, not only as a lover, a knight-companion, but as a friend, a Fëanorion. In Tindómion he could see Maedhros, the man his father loved, and the blood of House Fëanor and House Fingolfin drew one another like fire calling to fire.

_No._ He could not bear it. If he could go back in time he would give up Annatar's ring to Gil-galad, and damn the world.

With one move, he swept his arm and struck the bowl from its pedestal. The cool grass steamed.

“Thou fool!” Galadriel rounded on him. “Dost thou not know thou art linked? _He gave thee that ring._ Thou wert almost a betrayer.”

He said, “Almost, lady.”

“What did he say to thee?” she demanded.

“Nothing that concerns you or Lothlórien. He taunted me.”  
Inclining his head, he turned and climbed the steps to the lip of the hollow. There was fire in his breast, a conflagration of emotions. Glorfindel was waiting for him, gleaming in the night. He gripped Tindómion's wrist, looked in his eyes.

Tindómion did not speak until they left the garden. He placed wards about his mind as he did in Imladris at times. Elrond, too bore a Ring. After his experience with Annatar's gift, he did not trust them.  
 _I saw him,_ he told Glorfindel. _Elrohir and Vanimórë. I saw Maglor, and Fëanor. And Sauron. Ost-in-Edhil._ He paused. _Gil-galad._

_How much was in the present?_ Glorfindel asked, his mind voice gentle.

_Elrohir and Vanimórë certainly. My father? He was alone. His gear was simple, but not ragged. No insignia. It could be any time after his disappearance. But he heard me._

_And Fëanor? Sauron?_

_Fëanor, I do not know. When we destroyed that ring we both saw him in the fire._ Glorfindel nodded, eyes unfathomable with memories. _It was like that. Sauron asked me if it was worth it, and Hells, if I could go back and change my actions I would._ He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. _Galadriel is right. I am linked to Sauron in some way. Enough for him to reach through to me even here._

Glorfindel put a hand on his back. _I saw the link even then. But it does not poison your soul._ They walked. _You have decided then, to find Maglor?_

_Yes,_ Tindómion admitted. _Had she not angered me, I might not have. But I am no nearer to knowing where he is, and cannot search until Elrohir is safe._

_Istelion, you have always been able to talk to your father mind-to-mind._ In the night, Glorfindel's eyes were still blue as gemstones. _You never essayed it. And I do understand. But if you wanted to, you could._

Something in Tindómion shied like a nervous horse. Another part of him yearned. He said nothing more until they were all together. Everything was prepared. Glorfindel had said they were riding out, and since the Council must needs wait upon Curunír and Mithrandir, no-one thought it strange.

Tindómion told them of Galadriel's words concerning Elrohir, her accusations against all of them. He made it as brief as he could, excusing her. She was terrified for her grandson, yet unwilling — and indeed unable — to act until the Council's separate powers were gathered. Despite her grief, she thought like a king, and for that he could respect her.

Protectiveness hardened Elladan's face like foundation stones.  
 _I know what she wants, and what we cannot give her. If there is any healing for my brother, it does not lie with her._ He held them one by one in the glittering net of his gaze. _And I know what she says of you. The heart does not choose whom it follows and loves._

None of them slept that night. They waited until dawn seeped through the canopy of the leaves and rode out, a tight-knit group accoutred for battle. One of the wardens, Haldir, had sought permission from both Galadriel and Glorfindel to come with them. Elladan stiffened. His eyes might have burned Haldir to ash.

“We four have patrolled and fought together for many years,” Glorfindel said in a voice like the end of an argument. “We will do better alone.”

Galadriel inclined her head. Haldir's face darkened. Elladan said to all of them: _There is something between he and Elrohir from, I think, when we were young, but it is not love. Elrohir will not tell me, and actively avoids him. Even if Haldir's interest in my brother exceeded his duty to Lothlórien and he were willing to come with us, I would not take him._ †

Tindómion, who knew Haldir only by sight, remembered Galadriel's abrupt truncation of her words: “ _If only they had been raised here..._ ” and the fact that Haldir was Silvan. To a youth born in Imladris, feeling the first stirring of sexual desire, but bound by the Laws, such a man might seem interesting.

The way was long from Caras Galadhon to the northern edge of the forest, and they spent one more night under the trees. Their audible conversation was of the patrol, (The Galadhrim were utterly silent in their movements, and would report all they heard to their Lady). They used mind-speech for the important matters.

Tindómion felt a sense of freedom as they came out into the wild lands and struck east toward the ford of Anduin. Their pace quickened, horses hooves eating the ground. They watered them at the river, then crossed where a league of shoals raked Anduin into shallow streams. It was Glorfindel's intention to ride north until they came to the old Forest Road which cut through Mirkwood. No-one had been that way in a long time, thus its viability as a route was unknown, but they needed a way from West to East. It would take too long to ride north between the forest and the Ered Mithrim. There was another path, but that would take them into King Thranduil's realm and if he was no enemy, at the least he might delay them.

Galadhrim patrols hailed them, but they lifted their hands and rode on without stopping. Elladan's brilliant gaze went blank and inward. He did not speak at all for the first day, and they did not press him. His face was hard, strained with emotion.

It was possible to see, here and there, along the dreary marge of Mirkwood, trees that had been toppled by the vast burst of power in Dol Guldur. Even in Lothlórien they had felt it, Galadriel using Nenya to strengthen the mallorns against the storm-blast. There was neither sight nor scent of orcs, though they kept alert. Again, and now not caring if Galadriel searched for them in her Mirror, they freely spoke of Dol Guldur.

“It was his anger,” Elladan said. “Something happened then. There was a great statue behind his throne. Morgoth.” A shudder rippled through him. “A dark god. The air there went beyond black, and... _pulled._ The statue seemed alive, and there was power about it. Sauron fought it...” He closed his mouth on a snap of white teeth.

Erestor said, “Even he might fear his master's return.”

“I have known fear before but naught like that. Such inhuman rage, and _hunger._ ”

“Yet you faced it.”

“Believe me, I do not know what we did, or why. We stepped into that...no-place. And _he_ was there, like a storm of power.” Elladan paused. “But that was when _they_ spoke. I — we — knew them. We had seen them before as we journeyed to Dol Guldur.”

Evening was coming on. Insects hummed in the grasses, and the light lay rich and gold. It was peaceful, until one looked toward the forest, knowing what lay within.

“The air was full of poison,, like the drugs Men take that they say shows them other worlds. We saw the same, Elrohir and I: Fëanor. Fingolfin, others gone into Night. It was they who closed the door into the Void.” Elladan flung up his head in a gesture half-wild, wholly proud. “They could have possessed us. They could have come through. They did not. My grandmother thought they had.”

The silent question arched over them all. If a way to the Void was opened, could the dead return?

“She said they could not,” Elladan answered it. “Unless, as the Houseless are said to do, they possess a living body. She tried to...examine me. I did not permit it. It felt too much like him, Sauron.” He enunciated the word like a challenge. “Like a knife in the brain, being stripped and naked.”

“You did not let her in?” Glorfindel looked at him thoughtfully. It took a great deal of will to close the mind to Galadriel wearing Nenya.

Elladan lifted his brows in a haughty gesture that was entirely Finwëion.  
“I never cared before, but now I know why Elrohir hates it. No, I did not.”

“How is he?” Erestor asked.

“At least he is not thinking of killing himself.” Elladan turned his head toward the East. “And that is something. He is angry, of course. There was something I could not tell Galadriel about Elgalad, the one Vanimórë loves. His biter bit. It happened after I left Dol Guldur, and I had said I could not reach my brother. Sauron took away Elgalad's memories of Vanimórë.”

They were, all of them silent with outrage. There were times when one might wish not to love, to shed the pain of it, but memory was all one had at the end, bright and bitter. To take that away was breathtakingly cruel. Elves were not supposed to forget. And Vanimórë would see before him one who had known and loved him, and forgotten.

“Elrohir does not know why it was done. Just because Sauron could do it, perhaps. It makes no difference to Vanimórë. He will never endanger Elgalad.” He turned his head back. His eyes looked distant, focused on something other than his companions. After a moment, he said slowly: “We were told that Sauron had lost a great part of his power when Isildur cut the One Ring from his hand.”

“So we all assumed,” Erestor agreed. “Curunír and Mithrandir both judged that he must have put so much of his native power into it, that when it was taken from him he was reduced to little more than a spirit of malice that haunted the waste places of the world. But he is of the Ainur, and can never be utterly destroyed. He survived the downfall of Númenor, and took form again.”

“He was not what I expected. I have warned my father, Galadriel too. I think he is far stronger than we hope.”

“You expected something monstrous,” Tindómion said. “But your description reminds me of Annatar as was. Very fair, beautiful. Beauty is dangerous, deceptive. It is a mistake people make, to think evil should look horrific. Morgoth was not, or not at the beginning.” He had seen that through his father's eyes. Glorfindel nodded assent.

“I have to wonder...” The reins crumpled under Elladan's hands as he drew his mount to a halt. “What if we cannot find Elrohir, or cannot unbind him from his oath to Sauron? He said...Sauron said when he had us chained against crosses, after orcs had raped Vanimórë, when he had shown us what he could do and have done to us, he said _'I would prefer not to destroy the Elves, but that rather depends on them.'_ And that is why I have to wonder, did he mean it, and would we agree to anything to save Elrohir, even to open our doors to him or, if we cannot help him, is my brother to be considered a casualty of war?” He gazed from one to the other, his face like ice.

Tindómion closed his eyes, remembered with anguish holding Gil-galad through his last spasm of pain, the star-blue eyes going blank. The High King had been dying before Sauron's foot broke his ribcage; that act had been one of contempt, to break him as Fingon and Fingolfin before him, as if he wished to show that no matter how magnificent the beauty, the valour, the glory, it ended in defeat, in the red gush of blood and agony.  
Tindómion did not want kill Sauron. He wanted to torture him for Age upon Age. The thought of treating with him brought the red mist of madness down. He shuddered, felt a hand on his. He looked into Elladan's eyes, and they were so like Gil-galad's. Shaking his head at the impossibility of the question, he said, and his voice sounded as if it were dragged from his guts: “For Elrohir? What do you think?”

“It will not come to that,” Glorfindel vowed, and his white horse danced under him as if catching his savage mood. “Whatever he said, Elladan, what he wants is revenge. He would have us as his slaves, as Elrohir is his slave.” He slammed a fist down on his thigh. “This is not a matter of political expediency, old enemies forced into alliance. This is _Sauron!_ ” His rage was like a nimbus about him. His eyes were inhuman. This was the Glorfindel few saw save those he killed.

“And Elrohir is my _twin._ Do you think there is _anything_ I would not do to free him?”

“And there is nothing we would not do,” Glorfindel told him. “Listen! I have to believe that other minds are at work here, not Sauron's alone. He has sent Elrohir away from Dol Guldur with the one man in his service who has always tried to defy him, and few others.”

“The Valar, think you? But you say they care nothing for us.”

Glorfindel made a dismissive gesture. “Not the Valar.”

“Eru?” Tindómion asked. He had stopped revering anything or any-one after Gil-galad's death. He had seen the Valar at the great encampment after the War of Wrath. He had seen Sauron. He believed in them; they were real, but it was more difficult to believe that there was any power in Arda or beyond who cared about either Elves or Men.

“I do not know if Eru can reach into the world,” Glorfindel looked at him gravely. “But I want to think that he can. And there are powers that do not sit on thrones in the West, if what I learned in Valinor is true.”

Erestor broke the silence.  
“Elladan,” he said. “We must take this on trust, but I tell you this: if our attempt fails we will find another way. Even if we have to go to Mordor itself.” He raised a hand to his breast, bowed his head, as oathtakers did. Glorfindel and Tindómion did likewise, soberly, without hesitation. They might have been making an Oath to a king.

OooOooO

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *[From Ziggy’s The Sons of Thunder, chapter 34: Yôzâira.](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=51&textsize=0&chapter=34)
> 
> I thought of Tindómion's meeting with Annatar in [Magnificat of the Damned. I. Chapter 36. One Ring For The Elven King,](http://efiction.esteliel.de/viewstory.php?sid=43&textsize=0&chapter=36) and decided to tie it into this story.


	15. ~ Night in Rhovannion ~

**Night in Rhovannion**  


 

~ They had eluded the Nazgûl. It was not so hard in the forest; they were bound to it, but still it was terrifying. When the wraiths came, all else faded, the woods withdrew until it seemed as if they, not the Nazgûl, were ghosts. The eye had no choice but to fix upon them, and a cold, cold air ran before them.

One had to become at one with the forest, the trees, the leaf mould and soil. In that way, the wraiths sensed nothing. It was easy in any normal situation, not when fear scattered the mind. But these two were skilled, bound to the Wood. The Nazgûl passed them by until, with no warning one could see, they faded south, dragging darkness in their wake.

They waited for a long time.

“He called them back,” Bainalph murmured.

Legolas nodded. He reached for his father.  
“We will track Vanimórë and the others,” he said. “Elgalad is wise to give his word, but it troubles me.”

“Your father's bargain with Smaug.” * Bainalph raised his brows.

“Yes. Smaug is old and fickle. He served Morgoth, once. He would surely have known Sauron. I do not want Elgalad anywhere near Erebor.”

 

Bainalph said, “What does a dragon wish for more than gold?”

“Perhaps...power.” Legolas remembered his father's words, his own meeting with Smaug, all that sense of vast, lost glory. “The Dark Lord could offer him that. And if that dragon rouses...” He did not finish, did not have to.

Ever alert, though there was no further sign of the Nazgûl, they took to the trees, passing easily from branch to branch, bearing eastward.

“You should go back,” Bainalph advised.

“No. Father will understand now why I do not. He is preparing.”  
Thranduil's response had been filled with relief, love and anger. Legolas did not often defy him. “There are but five of them, and I am not certain, if it came to battle, how many would fight. But whether or no, we must try to free Elgalad before he reaches the Mountain.”

“Yes,” Bainalph agreed. “Something happened. His thoughts...”

They halted, standing on the branches, their bodies swaying a little to the breathing of the trees.  
“I know.” Legolas looked east through the weave of leaves.

A long journey even for Elves, this was, but swift. They rarely paused to rest. When the undulating grassland of Rhovannion came into view, both felt a sense of relief. The woods beyond Thranduil's kingdom were unwelcoming even to the Silvans. For too long had the shadow reached north from Dol Guldur.

“I will scout,” Bainalph said, and Legolas watched him fade into the landscape. He brought down two plump grouse, and carved a firepit from the earth, using deadfall that was tinder-dry and would produce no smoke whe it burned. He positioned the spit to one side so the fat would not fall on the flames.

Bainalph returned as the light mellowed.

“I can see nothing.” He handed a full waterskin to Legolas, who drank. “But the land deceives the eye.” It appeared as an endless roll of grass and dotted trees, but its crests and dips could easily hide a small group of riders.

“Has my father spoken to you?” Legolas asked after they had eaten and covered the fire.

“No.” A faint smile. “Neither do I expect him to.”

“He said he would call your soul, did he not?” At the startled green-gold glance: “Whom else was there?”

“And Gwathel vowed to call yours?”

“Yes. There was nothing else either of us could do, was there?”

“No.” Bainalph raised a hand, brushed Legolas' cheek. “Legolas, what did Sauron do to Elgalad?”

“Yes, that is the question is it not? He warned us _twice._ And the person who warned us the second time was not the Elgalad we know.”

“Do you think Sauron is linked to his mind?” Bainalph wondered. “That this is a trap?”

Legolas considered. “Does it even matter? There is _something_ , but I did not sense any presence, did you?”

“No, just a...difference.”

A profound difference.

“We must,” Legolas said. “be very careful.”

OooOooO

Elrohir flung a chip of wood on the fire. The flames blessed his face, drew diamond sparks from his eyes. After a moment, he rose silently and paced into the night. Vanimórë said nothing. He did not think the _Peredhel_ would attempt to escape, which was a pity. Sauron's claws were in his mind; that and his own sense of honour and guilt bound him with fetters of reforged steel.

They were a mostly silent group since that night when Elgalad had come to him, earning Elrohir's passionate wrath. The young Men were diffident and did not speak much save in low tones to one another when they camped. Elgalad watched him, and the expression in his clear eyes slipped under Vanimórë's skin like a flaying knife. Seeing Elgalad as he could be, _should_ be, was a constant reminder of how he had shaped Elgalad's life from birth. Better he had died with his mother than love Vanimórë.  
 _I cannot hold on to those I love, They are all taken from me.._

It was unfortunate that the memoryless Elgalad should still be attracted to him but it was not, Vanimórë thought, a directed desire. He would have been thus with any-one; it was the way of the wood-Elves, and his own way, also. Only the Noldor were cramped into restraining Laws.  
He did not dare to pursue the cruelty of his father's act into the depths of his soul. It was a futile defensive gesture; Sauron knew perfectly well how truly Elgalad's forgetting had devastated Vanimórë. But this was part of the never-ending game they played with one another. Sauron understood mercy, but gave it only when it fed into some greater scheme. Except once.

In any event, Elgalad could not forget forever. Elves did not. If he were free his memory would return. That was unfortunate.  
Now he slept, or seemed to. The old Elgalad would have been cast down by Vanimórë's rebuff, tardy though it was. This one was not troubled. He simply looked. A frown would cross his brow at times, but there was no shyness in him.  
The moon gilded Elgalad's face to pure whiteness, caught in his open eyes. Vanimórë looked until the pain was too much. It rose up from his gut, choking, scalding his throat. He controlled his breathing, reached into the peace of the night.

Elrohir's return was a silent run that nevertheless brought all of them to their feet.  
“Some-one is out there.” He kept his voice low. “Too quiet to be Men.”

Elgalad turned his head to the dark mass of the forest in the east.

“Thy people?” Vanimórë asked.

“It could be no-one else.” Elgalad sounded perfectly calm. He turned his head. “Let me go to them. I have vowed not to leave thee yet.”

“Thy vow would not constrain thy folk, would it?”

There was a smile, piercingly sweet but strange to Vanimórë. It held no hint of the shyness he associated with Elgalad, but was rather equal to equal.  
“No,” he agreed. “But they will understand mine.”

“I will go with thee. Elrohir, remain here with Ryath and Kirin.”

The pale grey eyes blazed. “What?”

“Thou art not doing very well as my second-in-command,” Vanimórë remarked. “Hast thou never taken an order in thy life?”

“Yes,” Elrohir whipped back. “From those I respected.”

“I am not asking thee to respect me. I am expecting thee to obey me.” Vanimórë locked eyes and wills. “If I die, whom dost though think will succeed me in due course? Moreover, there are my soldiers to consider. If they return to Mordor without me – and thee – that will not be looked on with favour. And so thou wilt remain with them. Is that understood, _officer?_ ”

Elrohir's face was like an alabaster lamp radiant with fury. Vanimórë felt it like the sun on his skin, rent through with electricity like nascent lightening.  
“You think I will attempt to escape?” he asked, all scathing hauteur.

“Unfortunately not; thou hast not the sense.”

“I honour my vows also.” He indicated Elgalad. “And what of _you_. There has surely been times you could have simply vanished.”

“Think'st thou I would let any oath bind _me?_ ” Vanimórë snapped his fingers. “I would break them without thought if it suited me. _Power_ shackles me, Elrohir. My mind would shatter, ultimately, if I pitted myself against Sauron's will, and what price freedom, then? No. And I have no hope thou wouldst break thine oath, but thou hast responsibilities as do I. Thou wilt remain here with Ryath and Kirin. If I do not return ride to Mordor and await orders.”

Elrohir, without losing one whit of his pride, capitulated. It must, Vanimórë surmised, be a uniquely Noldorin trait to look triumphant even in defeat. The _peredhel_ did not deign to use the Mordorian salute; he merely said, “Very well.” But could not apparently refrain from adding: “Perhaps, for once in my life, any gods there may be will favour me, and you will not come back.”

“We both know the god are not inclined to mercy,” Vanimórë returned dryly. “Come,” he said to Elgalad. “Thou shalt lead and I will follow.”

Elrohir's head came up. His eyes were as hot coals on Vanimórë's back as he and Elgalad walked into the night.

“They will not harm thee,” Elgalad said serenely, and although Vanimórë had said he would follow, they walked abreast. There was a flowing confidence in Elgalad's long stride. He glanced sidelong. “Elrohir does not really despise thee, though he tries.”

“His opinion of me is irrelevant. But he _will_ obey my orders. It will go ill for him if Sauron sees him as insubordinate.”

There was a long silence. Elgalad broke it. “Do we not all desire approval?”

“Well, Sauron is going to have to wait a damned long time if he seeks approval,” Vanimórë muttered. “Likewise myself.” The wilds of Rhovannion rolled ahead to the forest. He could see nothing. “Thou knowest,” he added. “That I would release thee if I could.”

“And thou knowest why I will remain with thee – until Erebor.”

Vanimórë had to repress a smile. “A good soldier would wish to find out all he could of the enemy's movements. It is what I would do.”

The moon slid in silver silk over Elgalad's head as he threw a smile. Then he put a hand up and stopped. He did not speak, at least not aloud. And a shape rose up from the grass as if summoned. Vanimórë could not see his face, and knew that the warrior wore battle markings. That strange and ancient magic was known in Dol Guldur. There was the shimmer of pale hair. Light ran down the blades of two long knives. Further away, another Elf rose, and Vanimórë heard the creak as a bowstring was drawn to full tension. If there were more than two, he could neither see nor hear them.

“Legolas,” Elgalad said. “Thou wilt not need thy knives, nor Bainalph his bow. Will they?” He addressed Vanimórë, who lifted his hands to show them empty. It was a token gesture. He bore his swords and daggers, and did not intend to disarm.

“Elgalad.” Legolas' voice was warm and low. “I can understand that you may trust him, but we cannot. We know whom he is.”  
  
“Yes, Sauron's commander. Yet though he serves evil, he is not.” There was such an absolute certitude in Elgalad it seemed unassailable. “And I _must_ travel with him to Erebor. Thou wouldst, or thou, Bainalph.”

“Nevertheless,” came the reply, a soft songlike lilt. “You cannot go to Erebor, Elgalad. And neither must Sauron's commander. That dragon must not be roused.”

“Come,” Legolas said. It was an order, but gentle.

They knew, Vanimórë thought; they knew that something was wrong with Elgalad.

“And what then?” Elgalad returned, equally soft. “Thou wilt kill him to prevent him raising Smaug?”

“Bring the other, Elrond's son.” Legolas addressed Vanimórë. “And then, turn back.”

Vanimórë smiled internally. “And if I do not?”

“Then you leave us with little choice.”

“Elgalad is free to go with thee,” Vanimórë said. “Elrohir has sworn an oath. I would give them both to thee if I could, but I cannot. And neither can I disobey my orders as easily as thou might think. Yes, I can turn back, and Sauron will know and drive me on. I know. It has happened before.”

The calm night grew thorns of danger like a dark rose.

“Then disarm,” Legolas said. “We will take you to the king.”

“I _could_ do that.” Vanimórë allowed. “But Sauron would expect me to fight. And I do not wish to fight thee.”

“There is no need for this,” Elgalad said strongly. He looked at Vanimórë and his face glowed in the night. “It could be the best way. And for Elrohir too.”

“It would not.” Vanimórë told him quietly, struck by the power and kindness of Elgalad's voice. And how he wished to deliver up his weapons and himself. He was weary of mind, knew it for a reaction to grief, and despised himself fully as much as Elrohir despised him. “He would not suffer me to remain imprisoned, and sooner or later he would bring the full force of his power down on thee.” He had no doubts how this clash with the White Council would end. Sauron was merely testing them, and they were likely to underestimate him, thinking his powers tied to the One Ring. They were not – or not entirely.

“We cannot let you go to Erebor.” Legolas' tone was steel in the night. “We remember the firestorm that destroyed Dale, that burned all in its path. Some of us have seen its ruins. For now, the dragon is slumberous, content. If Sauron wakes it, it is for one purpose alone. Is that not true?”

And forests burn.

“It is true.” He cast his mind toward his father, but Sauron was withdrawn into brooding thought, no doubt in preparation for his battle.  
“I do not intend to wake Smaug,” he said. “I may even be ordered to kill him.”

There was an indrawn breath from Elgalad. Legolas said, each world shaped into disbelief: “I have seen Smaug.” The inference was clear. No man could kill such a creature.

Vanimórë shrugged. “If those are my orders, I will have to essay it. So thou hast seen the dragon?” He was intrigued. “I had thought, from thy words, Smaug did not leave his ill-gotten den.”

“I was curious,” Legolas responded, timbreless, and Vanimórë tasted the lie. As did his father. His thoughts were not, after all, so very far removed.  
 _This interests me,_ Sauron said. _My spies reported that no Elves fought at Dale and Erebor._

“I thought no Elves fought Smaug's rape.”

“They did not. As I said, I was curious.”

“It takes a brave man to walk into a dragon's lair,” Vanimórë murmured. Legolas did not reply. Elgalad was silent. “And for what purpose? All the tales of dragons would prompt one to be cautious.”  
“Very well,” he continued when a stone silence was the only reply. “Come with us if thou wilt. How else wilt thou learn what I purpose?”

 

OooOooO

 


	16. ~ The Power of Dreams ~

 

**The Power of Dreams**

 

“Well?” Elrohir demanded.

“They will shadow us.” Vanimórë dropped down into a hunter's crouch. “I expected this, and no-one can hide from an Elvish tracker. They do not wish me to disturb Smaug.”

“Then why did they not just kill you?” Elrohir asked acidly. “What better way to prevent your going there?”

“I wonder.”

“They will have to stop thee,” Elgalad said. “If not now, then before we reach Erebor, but we do not kill without reason, son of Elrond.”

“Here is Sauron's chiefest servant and commander-in-chief of his forces.” Elrohir stared at Elgalad, and gave vent to a brief, bitter laugh. “Is that not a good enough reason?”  
 _Do they know what happened to Elgalad?_

Vanimórë's face was impassive. _They know something is amiss. But they should not let sentiment interfere with their actions._

“Is it not wise,” Elgalad said, “to learn all one can about one's enemy?”

“Do you not know enough?” Elrohir spread his hands. “And is he even an enemy to you?”

“To both questions, I would answer thee: No.”

“Then you are truly an irreclaimable fool.”

“And thou art blinded by the fires of thy hate,” Elgalad said, and came so close their bodies all but touched. Elrohir would not give ground.  
“He has told us power binds him. Dangerous, yes, mine enemy, I think not. Nor thine.”

“Thou _shouldst_ consider me an enemy,” Vanimórë's face was white as ice and as cold. He rose. “I will take the watch. Both of thee, I want no...altercations. Understand?”

“I will join you.” Elrohir swung away from Elgalad. Too troubling, too arousing, that silver beauty. Vanimórë was no less discomforting, but less likely to try and seduce him. He felt, after that incandescent moment some nights back, as if his skin were too tight. He wanted everything Vanimórë and Elgalad had to offer, and shot through that desire like choking black tendrils was guilt, disgust at himself. He had been able to glean some comfort from the fact that he had not been roused by Vanimórë's rape. But it was not enough. He was being eaten by lust. Elladan was safe; he need not worry about his brother any-more. Which gave him far too much time to think of other things. The idea of serving Sauron was still not-quite-real, or not here in this open land far from the living tomb of Dol Guldur.  
 _If Mirkwood does not want you in Erebor,_ he said. _you know they will stop you,_

“Of course they will.” Vanimóre stood relaxedly, arms crossed, gazing into the night. “Or they will try.” As Elrohir tilted his head back toward the camp, he lifted one shoulder. “It matters nothing if Elgalad hears or no.”

“Is that not careless?”

“Perhaps I am in the mood to be careless.” Another smile, and this time a real one for all it held a certain wryness.

Elrohir's eyes traced his face. “I see,” he murmured. “And because of this inclination to...carelessness, you did not kill the scouts? Now, I had expected Sauron– ” he spat out the name like a mouthful of acid. “would order that.”

“He wishes to know why, when the Wood did not fight Smaug's coming, they would be so concerned with my entering Erebor.” Vanimórë glanced back to where Elgalad stood in the middle-distance, his hair burning like a white fire under the stars. “It could be simple self-interest; they live in a forest, after all, and Smaug is no cold-drake of the North, no Glaurung, but a winged fire-drake. But I think somewhat else.”

“What then?”

“The scout who spoke to me was Legolas, the king's son. Thou hast heard of him?”

Elrohir's muscles locked. “I have, yes. What has that to do with anything?”

“Perhaps naught, save he said he had _seen_ Smaug, and yet the beast is, his words, _slumberous and content._ He does not fly to hunt, or not now, not yet.”

Elrohir picked apart the words. “He would be a fool if he walked into Smaug's presence.”

“A fool, or very brave.”

Impatient, heated, Elrohir paced. “You want us to be delayed,” he said at last. “Even detained by Thranduil.”

Vanimórë did not answer. His face gave nothing away, but of course if that came to pass, Elgalad would be freed. As for himself, Elladan was already riding from Lothlórien with some of the finest warriors that had ever lived. And the Dark Lord was preparing to meet the onslaught of the White Council. His attention would be otherwhere. _“there are matters that Sauron considers more important,”_ Vanimórë had said that night when Elrohir pretended to sleep.

But he had offered himself to Sauron, and vows were perilous either to make or break. And he had not yet been punished. He started violently from his thoughts as a hand came down on his shoulder.

“It would be better for thee to break an oath than serve him.”

“What would you know of it?” He pulled away. “You say power binds you, not an oath, but oaths have their own power.”

“I know it,” Vanimórë said quietly, and then with an unexpected and terrible compassion: “Elrohir, dost thou truly wish to become like me? Thou art already too close to it.”

Red fire blossomed behind Elrohir's eyes. “I am _nothing_ like you.”  
He could not remain here, better to be alone. He stalked into the night, aroused and hating.

OooOooO

 

The next evening they halted at a sizeable coppice of trees, perhaps some ancient outlier of the forest. At its centre, a spring rose and fed a deep pool. It was very quiet.

“Ladywells,” Vanimórë said. “There are places like this everywhere I have travelled.”

Elgalad nodded. “Wherever the Mother paused walking over the young Earth, these springs rose, or so the tales say.”

Such a belief would be heresy in Imladris, thought Elrohir, where they recognized only the Valar and Eru, but he too had read, in old books of lore and gathered legends, of these places, of the Mother Goddess.

Vanimórë and Elgalad both poured water onto the mossy sward in libation when they drank. Elrohir busied himself with his horse and harness while the two young soldiers set out food. After he had eaten, Elrohir approached the spring and drank; the water tasted of moss and sweet earth; it was very cold.

Despite the volcanic tumult of his mind, the tranquillity of the place was palpable. Elrohir found, as he sat down, that he felt he could sleep. Sleep had been elusive since Dol Guldur, and when it came, dreadful dreams ran with it.

As if he could read thoughts, Vanimórë said, quiet in the quiet: “I brought all of thee here because these Ladywells are sacred places. Even in the Harad and Rhun they are regarded with reverence. Orcs avoid them; anything of evil intent is, they say, punished, one way or another. So sleep all of thee.”

Elrohir felt his brother, knew Elladan was seated as he was in some distant place, holding him. His aura was starlight and blue-touched water.  
Sleep drifted down like the gentle fall of autumn leaves.

For what felt like a long time there were, blessedly, no dreams. Then they came, but they were nothing he knew, no Celebrian, screaming, clawing at him, no stench of orc, no last sight of his mother creeping aboard ship, a thin, huddled figure whom did not even glance back. (And sometimes, deep in his black and burning heart, he hated her for that). Such were his dreams.

Sometimes, they were worse.

He saw an Elf, long hair streaming like sea-wrack; saw him with a great bow in his hands, with long knives. Once, he stood atop some tall building, while darkness overshadowed him like a spill of night. Another moment and he was in Imladris, walking toward Elrohir, face drawn clear and beautiful, the light in eyes green as forest leaves.  
And then he was everywhere, a cascade of images that gave Elrohir's vision-fraught mind no time to think while loathing and desire swept through him in bursts as keen as pain. _Ravëyon,_ the Elf said in a voice like music. _Ravëyon._ Son of Thunder. An eagle cried from far above the mountain snows.

It was a time of war. There was a louring red glow under black clouds, a city, burning. Black-sailed ships sailed up a wide river. Elrohir saw himself in battle, Aícanaro fuming orc-blood. He saw Elladan, Aragorn, an army, and, rising up in stark power, the colossal black gate of Mordor, the Morannon. He had never seen it in life, but it had been described to him. There was no doubt. He saw a Nazgûl, black crown over nothing but the searing glare of invisible eyes. He saw the fair Elf again, pale hair flowing like a war banner...then naked, chained, writhing as a voice, Sauron's voice, said, “'You can have him. You can have him serve you…please you. He could be your slave…” *

He woke, gasping, pushed the wool blanket aside and rose, walked to the pool. The water was silk in his hands. He drank, let it fall over his face.  
There was no moon visible but the stars seemed closer, more brilliant, than when he had laid down to sleep and he knew, from his years of hunting the wilds, that this was the deepest part of the night. The young Men slept, but he could see neither Elgalad's silver hair, nor Vanimórë.

Pausing only to buckle on his sword-belt, though he sensed no danger in the night, he took the track through the copse. He had no doubt that Elgalad would use this opportunity to seduce Vanimórë. A frisson of lust, distaste took him. But the dream...his father possessed foresight and had passed it on to his children. Elrohir despised the gift; it had not warned him or any-one of his mothers capture and torment. But one single note of hope rang in his mind. If this dream was foresight, he, Elrohir was not fighting for Sauron.

He saw Vanimórë almost at once, a tall standing shadow. But he was alone. His senses were astonishing. Elrohir could walk without sound, but Vanimórë turned nonetheless. His face looked like a star, remote and splendid.

“Has he gone, then?”

“I wish he had. The Elves are out there. He went to speak with them.”

Surprising himself, Elrohir said, “You know he will not leave you. He may have been made to forget you, but his soul knows.”

Vanimórë said, “I told him long ago that there was no world for us. Better that he should never remember.” Then, as if brushing the matter aside, his eyes looked deep into Elrohir's. “What is it?”

“This place...” Elrohir did not want to ask Vanimórë anything. Pride wrestled with his need for answers.

“Didst thou dream? It is not uncommon.” He raised a hand. “If thou wouldst speak of it, go within.”

Under the trees, Vanimórë's face still gleamed. “Well? I cannot help thee if thou wilt not tell me.”

“ _Help_ me?” Elrohir almost laughed. “Says the man who cannot even help himself.”

“My case is...different.”

“Of course. It would be.” Contempt was icy on his tongue.

“The Ladywells,” Vanimórë continued without heat, “are, as Elgalad said, places the Mother paused on her journeys when the world was young, before even the Valar came. I know she is not recognised by the Noldor, but the wood-Elves know of her. She is real enough, although I have never been sure _what_ she is.” His lips curled up in a faint smile as if thinking on a memory. “Thus there is power here, and those who rest in these places often dream true dreams.”

A breeze came from somewhere, soughed through the leaves.

“I dreamed of war,” Elrohir said reluctantly. He did not intend to argue religious beliefs with Vanimórë. “A battle fought at the Morannon. I was there, my brother...Men of the West.”

“War is coming. Perhaps not immediately, but it will come.”

“I was not fighting for _him._ ”

After a pause, Vanimórë said in a low voice: “Good. Let us hope this is a prophecy.”

Elrohir flattened his hand. He was not sure, even now, how much Sauron could read in his mind.

“If any place is safe from him, it is this,” Vanimórë said. “It is older than his first footsteps upon Arda.”

“Yet you can read my mind,” Elrohir snapped, hating to be so exposed.

“I have not tried. I guessed. Go on.”

“There is nothing more to say.”

“Is there not? You have foreseen that this is not the end for thee. Hold that very close to thy heart. Do not speak of it when we are outside; try not to think of it.” Then his tone dropped into deep gentleness. “Some things are above any oath given under duress, Elrohir.” He made fire and music of the name. “Thy love for thy brother is one. And he will come for thee. Thou knowest it.”

“Can he truly not hear us?”

“I am not entirely sure,” Vanimórë admitted. “But I think not.”

“What will you do?” Elrohir asked, curious. “If my brother does come for me?”

“That very much depends on how preoccupied Sauron is with the White Council. If he has no time to spare for me, I will do naught.”

“I do not believe you.” Elrohir hissed into his face. “You are his servant. Why do you pretend to be anything else?” But Vanimórë did not pretend anything. He was what he was. Elrohir simply wanted to _hurt,_ to breach that bone-deep self-confidence that no-one whom had experienced rape and abuse had any right to. His mother, after her rescue, had been unable to bear the lightest touch from her own husband and sons. That this man could shrug it off, unbowed and unbroken, made a mockery of Celebrian.  
“You know I will kill you ere the end.”

“Elrohir.” Again that music. “I know what torments thee but — ”

“You know _nothing_!” His fury exploded like wildfire in dry tinder. He slammed Vanimórë back against a tree.

“Thou art confusing the desire to dominate with rape. Battle-lust is common, not to feel it most _un_ common. It becomes vile only when it is acted upon.” He would not permit rape among those he commanded, encouraged his men to slake their lust with their own companions, or with those women who offered their bodies for coin. “Hells! The damned Valar should be cast into the Void themselves for gelding the Noldor thus.”

The night broke apart like a mirror reflecting light, dark, fire. There were only images, sensations. Elrohir saw the fair-haired Elf of his dreams, naked and chained, head thrown back in pain and appeal, as if he welcomed agony and rape. Who _was_ this? Why did he fan such such powerful flames in Elrohir's soul? The question dropped away, another glass shard. He half-heard the slither and clink of leather, weapons falling to the grass, felt warm flesh under his fingers, the iron solidity of muscle. There was perfume, earthy musk, the slip of hair heavy as pouring water. He pushed Vanimórë onto his knees, saw the elegant hollow of his back, the curve of his buttocks. And then there was...there was...Ah! Such tight heat, enclosing him, massaging the length of his swollen cock. He shuddered, afire. Every part of him burned. He slammed deeper, deeper, savage thrusts that only increased the tension, the hunger. He strove violently toward release.  
When it came, his mind went white. The gripping muscles drank him as he spilled, pulsing until there was nothing left but his own dry sobs.

For heartbeats, there was nothing but the afterglow. It was more than pleasure. There was no word for it, and it had been so long, so damned long since he had pleasured himself. His breath settled, his heartbeat calmed.  
And then like a torrent of scalding water came the shame, the horror of what he had done. He could smell the musk of his seed, and it was like _theirs,_ the orcs who had ripped into his mother's body. He pushed himself away. He could not find words, could barely see.

“Come with me,” Vanimórë's voice and firm touch were supremely untroubled. There were stars falling, grass, cool water on his loins, sliding down his throat. His mind screamed.

“Stop it.” Brisk, cool. “Thou didst not rape me. I _allowed_ it. I was willing. Trust me. I do know whereof I speak.”

Elrohir was aware of laying down, the blanket pulled over him. He wanted to fight, to howl his madness into the night, to take his dagger and geld himself, because only then...

“Idiot.” With an oddly comforting note of exasperation. “It is a dream. Sleep.”

A hand rested on his forehead. There were violet eyes, a rueful smile showing white teeth. Again Elrohir tried to speak. Sleep flowed out of the night and drew him away, an inexorable tide.

OooOooO

With a small wince, Vanimórë sat back on his heels, smoothing Elrohir's forehead. The power of the Ladywells was ever anomalous. Usually, the water brought deep sleep, as it had to Ryath and Kirin. But it could also bring visions and waking dreams. He had seen the dreams in Elrohir's eyes when he had come. He was only half awake, could be made to believe that his actions were a dream.

Elrohir's lust had been building for days. Better Vanimórë stand in the path of the firestorm than Elgalad. And, because he was used to such things, he had prepared himself.

He rose, walked to the spring and washed, then donned his discarded clothes and weapons. He bound back his hair. Elrohir had been brutal, but Vanimórë had expected it, and endured far worse. It was not the _peredhil's_ fault that sex and pain and guilt had become intertwined in him. His was a volcanic passion that should never have been caged and twisted; but though Vanimórë might tell him, and truly, that battle-lust was perfectly normal, Elrohir would not listen, and would find no healing with him. They were too alike, too damaged. Two broken people can rarely make one another whole. It would take something — some-one, else.

Elgalad still had not returned, for which Vanimórë was grateful, though a treacherous part of him wondered what he would have done, imagined all three of them together. He stood as he had before, watching the dark land, the endless arch of the sky. He planed his thoughts flat. _It was nothing._ It was not rape. When he told Elrohir that he had allowed it, indeed had facilitated it, loosing his weapons, offing his clothes, had not struggled or fought, he had not lied. He had stretched the truth a little in saying he was willing, rather, it was a command from his father he was not _un_ willing to obey. Elrohir was beautiful, fierce. There was much in him that reminded Vanimórë of Maglor. That blazing splendour. Yet...it is never pleasant to be used by some-one who despises you. It makes one an object, less than human. He was accustomed to that, but in a deep-buried part of him lived the child whom had longed to be an Elf and, even after, wished he could be accepted by them. He waited, patiently, for the soreness to ease. As it would.

A thin rind of pale sky grew in the endless East. Vanimórë turned as Elrohir strode from the trees. His emotions ran before him like a ship's bow-wave. This time he was quite awake. Before he could speak, Vanimórë, forestalling him, said calmly: “Is something amiss?”

Elrohir's hair was still unbound, flowing like a cloak of night about him. He pushed it back with an impatient hand. His eyes gleamed like watchfires.

“Amiss?” he echoed, and his voice was shaken. “I do not...I think...”

“Didst thou dream? It is common in these places.”

“A dream?” He grasped at the words. Vanimórë kept his expression bland.  
“Have you been here all night?” he asked abruptly.

“Yes. There is no danger. Elgalad's companions are out there.” He gestured. “He went to meet with them. Unfortunately I believe he will come back, but there is naught else.”

Elrohir was staring at him, scrutinizing his face, his body. Vanimórë simply looked back, one brow lifted in inquiry.

“I dreamed I was with thee.” A flinch ran through the words. But he was no coward. “I did not come to you, then?”

“The last time I saw thee,” Vanimórë told him mendaciously. “thou wert asleep. The water of the Ladywells is potent.”

“It felt real. It felt...”

“Do not let it concern thee. Rest a little longer. We will not wake Ryath and Kirin before daybreak. There is no real hurry.”

“I cannot rest.” Elrohir snapped. “I will hunt.”

“Do that. We can conserve our rations. I will start a fire.”

For a long time, Elrohir did not move, then, without warning, he stepped so close to Vanimórë their breasts all but touched. So much burned behind that crystal gaze as it delved, searched...

Vanimórë weathered the storm. He said, as if unconcerned: “What is it?”

Elladan shook his head. With a low curse, he turned on his heel, walked into the dimness of pre-dawn.

Vanimórë waited, then exhaled a long breath. He took one last circuit of the copse, then went to the clearing, gathered dead wood for the fire, and lit it. Fire. So useful, so potentially deadly. And that was Elrohir: an inner fire that had nowhere to go. It would burn inward and destroy him if he could not climb from this pit of hate and shame.

He had said he thought this place shielded his thoughts from Sauron, but he was not sure enough to reach to Glorfindel. He could only hope that when the time came, Elrohir would go to his brother. And if he believed that prayers were ever answered, Vanimórë would have prayed on his knees that his father be too preoccupied to know or care.

“Ah, Elrohir.” He fed another branch into the flames. “Thou art too fine to be wasted.”

 

  
**OooOooO**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * From Ziggy's The Sons of Thunder.


	17. ~ Elvenking ~

**Elvenking**

OooOooO

 

It would, in the end, have proved easy enough to enter Esgaroth. Once they struck the old road, they fell in with Eastern merchants making their way up from Dorwinion and points East. Trade had become more scarse since the coming of the dragon; when the Dwarves dwelt in Erebor metal-work and gems had poured from its mighty gates, bringing merchants from as far south as Haradwaith. Dale and Esgaroth had flourished. Now Dale was burned and broken, a ghost-city, and Esgaroth had become a place of fishermen and small farmers who worked the lands about the shore. But there was still some traffic from the East, mainly Dowinion wine that passed through to Mirkwood.

One of the trade caravans, a slow-lumbering collection of wagons, welcomed Vanimórë's small group with enthusiasm when they saw that all were well-armed. There were always wolfsheads in the wild lands who preyed outside king's laws, and one of their caravan guards was currently laid up with a broken wrist.

The head merchant, Lazraan of the House of Denesh, (a famous vintner, he told them, and Vanimórë nodded. He knew the name) was a substantial man of middle-age with all the assurance of the wealthy. He asked where they had come from and proposed that they journey with him.

Vanimórë knew that, despite their disguises, Lazraan had, within a short time of meeting them, combed through their story and did not believe it. Traders had a keen curiosity, a sixth sense for trouble, and none were stupid.

Lazraan waved a hand back at his wagons.  
“Red Harvest,” he said, revealing a ruby-studded tooth as he grinned. “Fit for a King. An Elven King, no less.” He used the Rhûnaic word, _Esshenin_ “The House of Denesh has been selling wine to the Great Forest for hundreds of years.” He went on to say that he had first come on this journey when he was fourteen, had taken over from his father ten years ago. It was the only journey he made, and was worth it, to sell to a king, even if gouged by the middle-man of Lake Town.  
“And I do not think that these _Esshenin_ are demons,” he declared, waving a heavily-beringed hand. “I have seen them. The town Master feasts them at times. Still, unchancy to cross, I would say.” His strong fingers flickered. Behind his veil, Vanimórë smiled.  
“I would agree with thee.”

Elrohir and Elgalad, riding alongside, were looking at him. They did not speak any of the tongues of Rhûn.

_He knows we are Elves._

_I said we would never pass as Men._ Elrohir sounded disgusted. _Now what?_

 _He will not say anything. He is curious. Traders always are. I said if we needed a story we could use this one, but it matters little._ Vanimórë was not concerned. He had never tried to look like a Man before, never even considered it, but living among Men rather than Elves he had also forgotten how different the latter were, even to the way they walked. The truth was, it did not matter if they could not enter Esgaroth, though he thought they could, under Lazraan's generous robes. The Dark Lord's network spread far and, by his use of the spy-language, the merchant had made himself known, indicated that he also knew exactly whom Vanimórë was, and that he would render all the aid he could. While Vaniórë was all-but unknown in the West, the East was a different matter. But even had Lazraan proved no more than a merchant, they did not have to enter Esgaroth. Sauron had stipulated Erebor, and they could skirt the lake.

Joining the merchant was, in fact, a relief. The ride north had become fraught. At first Elrohir could not speak without anger, until the wearing of the days or, perhaps, his communications with his brother tempered him a little, at least toward Elgalad. Elgalad himself had forgotten, or rather, been made to forget, the diffidence that marked his relationship with Vanimórë before before Sauron's spell. Vanimórë approved of that, but it was hard to fend off Elgalad's sensuality. He did not even want to. He could only retreat behind a cool mask that apparently fooled neither of his companions.

Legolas and Bainalph were still shadowing them, though Elgalad no longer slipped away to meet them. His attention seemed wholly centred upon Vanimórë and, at times, Elrohir. Elgalad seemed to understand the demons that racked the _peredhel_ , and did not feed them. There was one exception: when Elrohir said anything derogatory about Vanimórë, Elgalad would defend him. It was touching, might have been amusing, but for the fact that, without his memories, Elgalad knew virtually nothing about Vanimóre and thus it was disturbing, hinting that some deeper awareness had not been so easily purged.

Perhaps Sauron, a master of mind-work, had deliberately left that shadow of recognition within Elgalad. However it was, he defended Vanimórë, which resulted in the fragile amity between he and Elrohir crumbling. Vanimórë could not allow them to argue. Elrohir was supposed to be in training, (no matter that he might be freed) and no captain of Mordor would be so unrestrained, so defiant. Vanimórë expected professionalism from those under him and, though Elrohir was a superlative warrior, he had never been put in harness.

Vanimórë withdrew himself from both of them save when he was forced to step between, and the journey became silent but for a few desultory words. He could have spoken to Ryath and Kirin, as indeed he did, but although he had, on occasion become extremely familiar with those who served under him, this was not the time or the place. He fell back, almost reflexively, on his father. Vanimórë was not sanguine about the clash between Sauron and the White Council and was, besides, curious. His father, he had concluded long ago, might toss him unconcernedly to Melkor or Ar-Pharazôn, but had, so far, spared him events that would have destroyed him: he had been sent from Angband before the War of Wrath, (and had wondered if some Maia foresight had prompted his father to suggest it) and from Númenor before it fell. Apparently, Sauron deemed the clash of powers in Dol Guldur too dangerous for his son to face.

Perilous it might be, yet Sauron emanated confidence, as well he might. He would show forth exactly as much power as he needed to, then withdraw. Dol Guldur would hold the memory of his presence for a long time, but Vanimórë doubted it would ever house him or the Nazgûl again. And that was just as well. It had almost become a portal from the Void — and to it. Better if it were utterly razed and buried.

Thinking of this, he turned his eyes to Elrohir. Fëanor's soul had brushed through him, as Fingolfin's had traced through Elladan. He wondered (and hoped) if for a moment, those two souls had felt the world both had been ripped from in agony. Or would that be more torture visited upon those already in torment? The thought _hurt_ , and he could do absolutely nothing about their fate save die and join them in their agelong battle. But he had expended such _effort_ on staying alive; to realise he had been wrong, should have killed himself long ago, shook him to his bones, ran against all his instincts and left only shame.

As the light dragged its bright robe westward, the wagons halted and fires were lit. The scent of roasting meat mingled with the sweet smell of the plain's grass. Lazraan sent two bottles of Red Harvest to Vanimórë's fire. He lifted a hand in thanks and trimmed the lead from the corks, setting the wine aside to breathe while they ate. Ryath and Kirin served the simple meal of hot meat and flatbread then, as he had taught them, gracefully poured the wine. He nodded approval, took the bottle and filled their own cups full. In the firelight, their eyes sparkled with pleasure. Red Harvest was far beyond the purse of soldiers and this vintage, as Lazraan had said, was served at the tables of kings. The young men backed away to sit a little apart, and presently began to talk in soft voices as dice rattled and fell.

He caught Elrohir's fiery, stony look and raised his brows.  
“How do you do it?” Elrohir asked, with a derisory curl of his lips. “How do you ever earn such loyalty.”

“If thou dost not know that, no-one can teach thee,” Elgalad said. “You know perfectly well why warriors are loyal to their captain, or I would hope so.”

“I was not asking you,” Elrohir flashed.

“Stop it.” Vanimóre raised a hand, and they both looked at him. “Bloody hells, I would rather have thy silence than thine arguments. Thou art not children.”

He caught a look of frank amusement in Elgalad's eyes as he bent his head in acquiescence, took a sip of wine. Elrohir came lithely to his feet.  
“I will watch.” He stalked away.

“Do not tease him,” Vanimórë told Elgalad.

“I am not, as thou knowest.” Those impossibly clear eyes stared straight into his. “But I cannot allow him to cut at thee and say nought. He does not know thee.”

It almost took Vanimórë's breath. Elgalad was being _protective_ of him. _“I cannot allow it.”_ No-one had ever protected him. It hollowed out his chest, left a leaden sense of utter emptiness, a longing for something he had never known.  
“Neither dost thou know me.”

“That is inarguable,” Elgalad commented. Vanimórë heard the smile in his voice. Facing away from the main camp to eat, they had drawn aside their veils but replaced them after. Their caution was hardly needed now, but it it would make the journey easier, and there was no need to flaunt what they were. “But I have observed thee,” Elgalad continued. “Thou art so patient with him, thou doth care for thy men. There is courage and honour in thee. These things are easy to see.”

“Thou art wrong,” Vanimórë corrected him. “I am neither courageous nor honourable.”

Elgalad nodded as if he had made a point. “And thou and Elrohir both are filled with self-loathing.”

Vanimórë did not answer.

OooOooO

They came out of the dawn mists, moisture like crystals on their armour. Vanimórë had heard them approach, as had Elrohir and Elgalad. The warriors ranked behind their leaders, fading into invisibility.  
The merchants, still rising from their beds, grouped close behind the swords of their guards. Ryath and Kirin drew weapon then, at look from Vanimórë, sheathed their blades. He sent out a thought to Sauron, met a wall. Behind it, he felt a...waiting, pressure building like a storm. He flicked his eyes south toward distant Dol Guldur.

Lazraan hastened forward.  
“Sirs?” he questioned.

“You have something of ours, merchant.” One Elf stepped forward. There was a rustle of movement and a line of arrows were nocked.

Lazraan's eyes rolled toward Vanimórë who gave an infinitesimal shrug, flicked his fingers.

Elgalad let drop his veil, raised a hand.  
“There is no need for weapons, Dínenech.”

“The King thought there might be,” the captain replied. “We are to escort you home, Elgalad.” His head turned. “And those with you must come before the King. Will you disarm peacefully?”

Elrohir met Vanimórë's eyes, brows frowning, but behind his eyes burned a light of bright hope.

“Ryath, Kirin. Disarm.” _Tell thy brother of this development. It is far easier this way. Besides,_ he added. _I have never mastered the art of not getting hit with an hundred arrows, hast thou?_

 _They would not kill me,_ Elrohir rejoined. _But you do know they will kill_ you?

 _Well, and so they should,_ Vanimórë slid his sabres from their sheaths, laid them on the grass. He followed with his daggers. Elrohir tossed his own weapons down. Warriors came forward to take them.

“You.” The captain stepped forward. “are Elrohir, son of Elrond?”

Elrohir replied curtly: “I am.”

“We have received word of you,” he nodded. “The King orders that both you and this one—” with a gesture at Vanimórë. “and the Men be bound and brought to the Halls.”

“I will not be bound.” Elrohir's eyes flashed.

“It is safer,” Vanimórë told him. “You know not what Sauron may make thee do.”

“What, escape? Does he think we can run faster than an arrow's flight?”

“It is better to err on the side of caution.” No, Sauron would know they could not escape without dying, but if he cut his losses, he might induce them to kill as many as they could.

Elrohir did not like it, but made no further protests. Vow to Sauron or no, he would be a fool indeed to spoil this chance of freedom. Vanimórë, as he held out his hands for the bindings, wondered (again) if Sauron had never intended they seek out Smaug, merely sent them out of harm's way until the battle with the White Council was over. It was hard to believe that he would act so negligently otherwise, but perhaps he did not know that both the wood-Elves and Elrohir had ways to communicate that were deeper even than mind-speech.

As for himself, who had been a prisoner of war before, he felt no shame at being bound. It was Elves of the Greenwood whom had captured him in Mordor too, he recalled with a wry inner smile. He spoke calmly to Ryath and Kirin, then to Lazraan, assuring him that all was well and there would be no repercussions. The warriors waited in patient columns, utterly still as the sun burned off the mist. And then they marched.

There was no conversation. All were separated, walking alone, though Elgalad slipped among them to walk beside Vanimórë and Elrohir at times. When Vanimórë asked where were Legolas and Bainalph, he gestured beyond the company.

They crossed the shoals of the River Running south of the Long Lake, and the wall of Mirkwood rose before them. Dark and foreboding enough, yet this was a sun-blanched shadow compared to the forest about Dol Guldur. Vanimórë remembered bringing Elgalad here on just such a hot summer day, parting from him. They had met briefly, over one hundred years later and still Elgalad had been filled with love, diffident, as a youth is to their mentor. Now, cleansed of that dross, he was a different person altogether.

It was clear that this company at least had been told of Elgalad's lost memories. When they stopped for the night, eyes came to rest on him, speculative, oddly gentle. Now, hearing the constant susurrus of wind stroking the edges of the forest, Vanimórë said to the warrior closest to him: “I need to speak with thy captain. It is a matter of some import.”

Dínenech came quickly, that guarded look on his face, muscles rigid. He regarded Vanimòrë like a wary cat, this thing who served Sauron but looked like an Elf.  
“You wished to say something?” he asked crisply.

“Thou shouldst blindfold me,” he said. “until we come to thy king's halls. Sauron can see into my mind.” Probably he had been able to see into the minds of the Elves captured in Dol Guldur, into Elgalad's and already knew the ways of the kingdom, but Vanimórë would be damned before he contributed to his father's knowledge of this realm.

The warrior's mouth thinned as if he were angry at himself for not thinking of it. He nodded. One of the men came forward with a cloth, and Vanimórë stood still as it was tied over his eyes. He let his senses slip away from sight, felt the proximity of bodies around him, the earth underfoot, smelled leather and steel, grass, flowers, heard the wind, the creak of harness. He had been taught in the pits of Angband to fight blindfolded, and that training allowed him now to walk without hesitation but he sensed, after a moment, Elgalad come close to him. When a hand touched his back he felt it like a flame.

“Thou didst want this to happen,” Elgalad murmured. “I asked Legolas to contact Thranduil, and have him send a company. Thou wouldst not disarm for Legolas and Bainalph because, as thou didst say, _he_ would expect thee to fight. There had to be enough to make thy death certain.”

Almost he smiled at how well Elgalad read him. “Very good,” he complimented.

“He will not kill you.” Such absolute certainty in his voice. Of course it would not be wise; Sauron would, sooner or later punish any-one who killed his son, not from sentiment but because of the _waste_. Vanimórë was too useful. Still, _I would,_ he thought, _If I were the king._

The scent of the forest swallowed him, rich with humus, year upon year of fallen leaves, shy and secret flowers, ferns, water. There was also the acrid tang of spiders, and though it was not close, Vanimórë felt the warriors watchfulness increase. Dol Guldur's sorcery could be sensed like the smell of old burning borne on a cold wind, but it collided with the ancient power of the Elves. That was what truly created this oppression: a clash of magic.

He judged how far they walked, little more than three leagues, he thought, and the way was paved, sensible if one wished to march an army out. Echoes reached him then, of some vast space cradled by a womb of rock.

“There are steps here.” Elgalad, whom had come back to his side, spoke softly. Steps, wide and shallow. He passed through what he assumed must be the main gates; the sound of voices floated up through the air to a ceiling high above. There came a wash of air, a slight creak from great hinges as double doors shut behind him. His blindfold was undone. He blinked, let his eyes adjust. A wide corridor ran before him, the floor sloping downward at a gentle gradient. Lamps hung from the ceiling, and the walls were carved. Flecks of quartz caught the light and winked.

They went on, briskly, the path sloping, swooping, branching. The King was not making it easy for any attacking force. Distantly, Vanimórë heard the sound of falling water, music like something in a dream. He mapped his steps as one always should in a strange place; here was a turning, there, a crossing of ways, now the floor descended more steeply. Huge doors arched up ahead, flanked by guards.

The great hall was far vaster than he had imagined. Slim pillars cut from the stone upheld the roof, and walkways twisted and curved across empty air. The dais rose in the centre of the cavern, the throne crowned by the branched antlers of a giant Elk, and the king sat beneath them, watching. Vanimòrë, who had his own innate sense of drama, smiled. Thranduil was robed in silver and green, a crown about his brow entwined with ground ivy, wild roses, honeysuckle. They looked dew-fresh, and Vanimórë remembered how the flowers had bloomed even in Mordor where the wood-Elves trod.

He had seen the King no more than two or three times, during the battles on Dagorlad and Mordor, and retained respect for one whom had taken the crown in blood and grief from his slaughtered father. This man, though, was changed, immaculately poised, fully aware of his own power. Their eyes met. The King's were the colour of northern skies in winter, and as cold.  
“Sauron's servant,” he said, and rose, descended the steps from his throne. “Vanimórë. And one of Elrond's sons.”

“King Thranduil.” He inclined his head, saw Elrohir, now beside him do the same. The _peredhel's_ face was closed like a book. No love was lost between the Noldor and Sindar, but that was not the same as outright enmity.

“You know I could not have let you seek out the dragon.” The warriors retreated at a wave from his hand.

“I know.”

“One might almost think you _wanted_ to be captured.”

“I wanted Elrohir captured.” The grey eyes flashed to him.

“Of course.” Thranduil tilted his head. “You, Elrohir, are the easiest to deal with.”

Elrohir glanced at Vanimórë.  
“My brother rode from Lothlórien with Glorfindel, Eestor and Tindómion,” he said. “We can communicate still. I have already told him of our capture.”

 _Thank Eru,_ Vanimórë thought.

“Indeed? Then they will take the path through the forest. It is unwise beyond the borders of my realm, but far quicker than riding north. I will send guides. Until they come, you may consider yourself a...guest.”

Vanimórë could feel the relief that flooded through Elrohir like heat, despite the pause before the last word. A guest, but a guarded one, as was only common sense. He said, “I must tell thee that Sauron can link to our minds, force us, perhaps, to act in ways that may endanger thy people, even thee.”

Thranduil's eyes came to him. “Interesting that he has done nothing yet.”

“He is not foolish,” Vanimórë smiled dryly. “Any act would doubtless result in our deaths, and he would rather have us alive, but I would not second-guess him.” He did not even know if his father had foreseen this eventuality, even planned for it.

“The mind-link. Yes. Do you know,” the King raised his brows. “that the Nazgûl have never penetrated my realm?”

“I know it.” Sauron had been intrigued more than angered. He had once said it was not so different to the Girdle of Melian about Doriath, save it did not rely on the power of a Maia, but was woven between the forest and the King.

“There is a place we may speak,” Thranduil said. “And I have questions.”

Elrohir, Ryath and Kirin were lead away. Elrohir said nothing; he had that otherwhere look about him which meant, Vanimórë assumed, that he was deep in communication with his twin. Vanimórë was escorted from the hall in a different direction to the way he had come, over walkways and through curving, ascending passages to a small doorway that opened out onto the surface. Behind, the hill jutted against the sky, patches of blue showed high above. Fruit trees grew amidst short, rich grass.

Vanimórë felt the Mother immediately; this was a place like the Ladywells, but here the arcane touch of Dana mingled with the equally mysterious earth-power of the Elves. He had felt it when diving through Elgalad's mind to link to Glorfindel. It was almost alien, like a drink that reminded him of something, but that he had never before tasted.

The guards withdrew, waiting. Vanimórë was still bound.

“Here, I believe, we may talk.”

“Thy realm is full of surprises,” Vanimórë murmured.

“Tell me,” the King said. “Of Dol Guldur.”

“I will tell thee first of Elgalad.” His words were almost inaudible, only for Thranduil to hear. _Or can I speak to thee in this manner?_

 _You may. Yes. Elgalad. His memories. Was it_ he _who did this thing?_

 _Yes. He knew it would make no difference to me, that I would never put Elgalad in any danger, whether he remembered me or no._ He added. _It is the best thing that could happen to him._

The King regarded him, eyes unblinking. _I would be inclined to agree with you. Yet you raised Elgalad, you, a servant of the Dark. He came to us sweet-natured, loving, generous, lettered and already trained in arms._

 _It is his very nature to be generous and loving,_ Vanimórë responded. _I made him emotionally dependent on me, because he had no other to love._ Bitterness saturated his mind-tone, was wrung out like heart's-blood.

 _Tell me,_ Thranduil said. _Elgalad was never willing to speak._

So Vanimórë told him of his mission beyond the White Mountains of Gondor, of the Elf-woman he met who carried a child, and how she died giving birth, not of any complication save grief for her lost lover, whom she knew was dead. Vanimórë had found his drowned body and buried it. But he did not tell the woman. There was no need. Her soul knew.

 _I heard of this._ Thranduil raised a hand, frowning. _Amroth the King and Nimrodel. There is a song sung about it. Elgalad is of a line of kings and kin to me. Why did he never tell me?_

 _I did not know the situation in Laurelindórenan, then,_ Vanimórë said. _And the weight of lineage can be a heavy thing. Elgalad was not raised to be a prince or a king. I never told him._

Thranduil frowned. _Go on_

Vanimórë told of the bright years when Sauron gave him rein, of bringing up the child to young manhood. He had raised Elgalad as he wished he had been, as he would have brought up a child of his own, had he been free to do so. But he could not sire children and, even had he been able to, wanted no part of him to stain another. He said none of these things, and of his own life, he did not speak, but he told of Elgalad chained in Dol Guldur, and then of the terrifying moments when the membrane between the world and the Void was breached, what he felt and saw. Thranduil's expression froze, but he nodded as if Vanimòrë had confirmed something.  
 _And you are sure he will retreat before the White Council? Yes, I know of them: Eldar and wizards._ His lips curled a little.

_I am sure of it._

The light had shifted, the glade warm in the summer afternoon. A bird piped softly, drowsily. Thranduil moved to the rill of water that seeped down the rock, cupped his hands to drink, and beckoned. He watched as Vanimórë drank, sprinkled a libation on the grass.  
“So, you recognise the Mother?” he said aloud, and with a look of surprise.

“Why not? I have encountered her worship in many different lands.” He did not add that he knew her, or rather was acquainted with her. No man could possibly know Dana.

_As I said before: you are strange. They say Annatar wore a fair and charming shape in Ost-in-Edhil, just as you do, here and now. And then there is Elgalad, who loves you. He is the only reason we are having this conversation._

_Love me. In past tense._ The best thing that could have happened. To feel as one bereaved was selfish. _Thou hast noted he has lost his stammer? Did he ever tell thee where that originated? No? Dol Guldur. I left him near the borders of Laurelindórenan. His parents were from there, after all. But he followed me to Dol Guldur. Sauron was not there, then but the Nazgûl were, and they captured him._

Thranduil went still. _No. I knew naught of this. And how did he escape?_

 _We were both bound. I had been too long away from my...master. In Rhovannion I freed myself and Elgalad, killed the escort, and we drove away the Nazgûl with fire. Then we came north — to thee._ He had thought then, that Sauron would kill Elgalad, even force him to do it himself, at least to hurt, to rape. Now, he was not so certain. Alive, Elgalad would always prove a more effective control than any punishment.

The King's eyes swept him from head to heels and back again.  
 _That was a wise act. We love him, but until now, his heart was not truly ours._

 _It will be._ Claws of jealousy stretched within him, traced cruel tips through his soul. His fingers dug into his palms. With a sudden, impatient twist, he freed himself. The rope slithered to the grass.

 _I wondered how long you would endure those._ Thranduil smiled faintly. He seemed unperturbed. _Did you not ask to be bound with steel when you were a prisoner of war? And would even those truly have held you?_

“I endured them to gain trust,” Vanimòrë said. “Thou art hardly unarmed, and an arrow could reach me before I could kill thee, I think. He does not want me dead.”

“We must speak more. Later. Now you will be escorted to your chambers We have to be cautious, you understand?”

Caution was, as Vanimòrë expected, a dungeon-room deep underground. He had been in worse, though any confinement reminded him too keenly of his incarceration in both Angband and Barad-dûr. But there was a pallet to lie on, a brazier, water jug, and a privy. The door was barred with steel allowing him to see out, though there was little to see. The dungeons were built within a natural crevasse, stairs winding up and down beside them. Some underground stream sounded, echoing against the stone. Ryath and Kirin had been brought here, too. He passed them and paused to speak, which the guards permitted. They looked pale and nervous as well they might, but there was such relief in their faces when they saw him. He hoped it was not misplaced. After a moment, the guard ushered him on, not touching, until his own cell door shut behind him.

He sat on the pallet, shoulders propped against the wall, tipped his head back. Sauron remained remote, though Vanimórë guessed he knew what had happened and was not overly concerned as yet. The water echoed forlornly in the semi-dark. With nothing else to be done for now,Vanimórë folded his arms behind his head and let himself fall asleep. He had not slept so well since his journey from Mordor to Dul Guldur.

OooOooO

“Who is he?” Thranduil asked.

Elrohir looked him directly in the eye. Tension clenched itself through his muscles.  
“Believe it or not, he is the Dark Lord's commander-in-chief.” He paced the room like a black cat. “Did he not tell you?”

“I did not ask.”

Elrohir stood still, pushed his hands into his loosened hair. His guest room was a world away from the dungeons but Thranduil had posted guards at the door. While he could well understand a man making a vow to save his brother, he was not minded to be lax in security.

“We know so very little about the armies of the Dark.” Elrohr said, as if to himself. “The orcs, the wargs, they are nothing, arrow fodder. Vanimórë commands legions of Men. Mordor breeds them for war, and we have never seen them.”

“I have seen his armies of Men,” Thranduil corrected. “In the Wars of Eregion. Few orcs fought there. There were Men from the East and South. What else? What _is_ Vanimórë? Oh, come, now. He has the looks of the _Golodhrim_ , but there is something in his eyes, something _other._ ”

Elrohir dropped his hands, shrugged. “He has served the Dark a long time. Ask him. I am not interested in an orc's whore.”

Red-hot ice sluiced down the King's back. It was the greatest fear of a warrior, even he. He said, coldly, to hide it: “Is he?”

As if something had pricked him, Elrohir winced. “It is a punishment. I saw it happen. He...Vanimórë would have let us go, if he could. And so...” he spat out the words. “My brother and I were bound, and _he_ summoned Great Orcs.”

Revulsion surged in Thranduil's gut. It was a wonder Vanimórë had survived, but the King did not say that. Elrohir's rage against Sauron's servant was _because_ of that very fact, Elgalad had told him. To all intents and purposes, Celebrian had _not_ survived. Vanimórë had. How?

“I need you to tell me all you have learned,” he said crisply, putting that mystery aside for now. “If you can. Vanimórë has said the Dark One is linked to your mind with this vow.”

Elrohir prowled. “It is like not being able to close a door when something terrible waits without, something you cannot fight. But here, I noticed as soon as we entered the forest, it is not so intense, as if a barrier lies between. I can speak. He is not...his mind is not upon me. But if it were this easy to escape him, why...any of it?”

“Even his plans can go awry.” Thranduil gestured to a side table where wine and cups had been placed. “They have before. Sit and drink.”

Still restless, Elrohir poured wine, drank and placed himself in a padded chair. One booted foot tapped arrhythmically on the floor.  
“Where is he?” he asked. “Why did you not asked him these questions?”

“Where do you think I would house a servant of Sauron?” Thranduil queried, then waved a hand to forestall the obvious retort. “You are, or were one too, but not willingly. Vanimórë has served the Dark for a long, long time, as you yourself said. You do not think he should be imprisoned?”

“I think he should.” Elrohir seemed to speak unwillingly. “But he is too valuable to _him_ to keep or to kill.” He came to his feet. “But I think you _should_ kill him.”

“What did he do to you?” Thranduil was curious.

“He is twisted, an unnatural _thing_. How else could he serve _him_? How else could he live? Power binds him, he says, and I have seen it, yet he should be insane, _broken_ ”

Thranduil had never seen such a _complete_ man as Vanimórë, but he let that lie.  
“I _am_ considering killing him,” he said. “But it is not a decision I will make lightly. It will affect my realm and all my subjects.”

“I understand that.” But Elrohir was frowning. It was not enough for him. It would have to be. Against his hate, stood Elgalad's love, forgotten now, but not by Thranduil. No man could raise a child as Elgalad had been had he not given everything. It was difficult to understand but not impossible. Vanimórë was no orc or Nazgûl. He was not cold. Whatever his servitude entailed, and despite it all, he knew how to love. He wondered what Elgalad would do if he, Thranduil, decided to execute Vanimórë.  
“Death would be a release from bondage, if power binds him,” he mused.

Elrohir's white teeth glinted in a harsh smile.  
“He believes that his soul would be pulled into the Void and tormented for eternity. Did he tell you of what happened? I am inclined to believe it.”

Vanimórë had said, “Thou must ask Elrohir what he experienced. It is not for me to do so.”

“There are souls there,” Elrohir rubbed his chest, and the violence drained from his face to be replaced with a simpler anger — and sorrow. “The damned. No, not the monsters that served the dark, although those too, but Elves. I felt them. I felt _Fëanor._ ” A frisson of hate sparked down Thanduil's spine, a reflexive reaction to that name. “He was inside my soul, and fighting all that darkness, that _power,_ Morgoth.” He whispered the name that the Elves would lief had buried under the ruins of the Hells of iron to be forever forgotten. Elrohir's chin lifted. “I imagine you would find call that justice, that he would be in the Void, but he was not the only one. My brother felt Fingolfin. Do you know why they were imprisoned, they and others? Not for kinslaying, but because they defied the Valar and were lovers of men.” His eyes challenged, and there was fire behind them.

No, Thranduil would not call it justice, though he was of Doriath. He called it _malice_. He had never trusted the tales he heard of the Valar, and who else would have the power to send a soul to the Void? But neither did he grieve save for those of his own people who might have chosen the path to rebirth and found it instead a gateway to everlasting torment.

“There is nothing you or I can do about that,” he said coolly. “And we stray from the point. I must think of the threat that looms over my people. I could not permit Vanimórë into Erebor. That dragon has always been a threat. Used as a weapon, my realm would burn, and so,” he added. “could yours.”

“I know it,” Elrohir snapped. “Which is why I think Erebor was a mere ruse. There is something else, something Vanimórë has not told me.” He finished the wine, put the cup down with a snap.

“You may be right,” Thranduil agreed. “Still, if _he_ is occupied with the White Council, there is time to find out what it is. As for you, son of Elrond, possess yourself in patience until Imladris comes. There is some protection here from the mind of the Dark Lord. And I may as well use this opportunity to speak with those who come.” Of his own volition, he would never have invited any of the Imladrians, even Elrond, to his realm, but this was an exceptional time.

“I thank you.” Elrohir sank back into the chair, and for the first time Thranduil saw the relief. And the fear that underlay it. He was not sure he could escape his vow, what the Dark Lord would do to call him back. He had almost, _almost_ steeled himself to servitude under the Enemy. Almost, but not quite. He still believed in miracles. Vanimórë did not.


End file.
